A custom that made a deep impression on us children was the semi-annual “offering” in the Domkirke. Part of the revenues of priest and deacon was derived from free gifts of the people at Easter and Christmas--free, that is, to all appearances; but custom prescribed the exact amount of what was really a tax upon every householder. On these Sundays, when the last hymn had been sung and the sexton’s purse on its long pole had been poked into the farthest pew, the Dean put on his crimson robe with the big white cross down the back that made him look as if he were clad in the national flag, and took his place at the altar. The organist pulled a stop that set a little bell tinkling and started a silver star spinning in the organ loft. That was the signal for all the men to rise, and with the Amtmand, the Rector, and the Burgomaster leading on, they marched up to the altar and laid their gifts there in two piles, one for the priest, the other for the clerk, always silver, which made quite a heap before the last coin had clinked upon it. The organist always played the hymn with the longest and slowest metre while the procession was passing, to give it time, I suppose, and the order of procedure was rigidly maintained. For a boss carpenter, for instance, to have gone before a teacher in the Latin School, even though his offerings had been twice the size of the other’s, would not have done at all. They kept step very well to the music, going and coming back, though I fancied their march was a little brisker on the return, as if they were glad it was over. Odd what impressions children get and keep. To me, looking back, it seems the one really great religious ceremony in the Domkirke I remember, always excepting the time the King came and one other. That was when the Austrian soldiers, during the occupation in ’63-’64, celebrated the birthday of their Emperor with a high mass. There had not been a Catholic service in the cathedral since the Reformation, and there has not been one since. Perhaps it was that, perhaps it was the whole setting of august ceremonial and warmth and color that were foreign there; the uniforms, the bugles, the incense, with the strange tongue and the evident devotion of the soldiers who knelt on the marble floor--it all left an impression on my mind and heart that has never faded. It is rank heresy, of course, and I would never subscribe to it in cold blood, but it did seem somehow as if the old House of God came to its rights once more. Saints of old whose knees, bent in worship, had hallowed those ancient stones, walked again in the vaulted aisles, and the image of the martyred Bishop Leofdag in the wall outside seemed to nod as with understanding as we went by. I saw the lights go out with regret. Perhaps, unknown to myself, it had something to do with my desire in years long after to put a couple of stained-glass windows in the chancel that looks so white and cold. But they did not want them.