Taking turns with Denmark's northern neighbours, the English came right into
Copenhagen to decimate the valiant Danish fleet. From instinct as well as necessity,
Denmark relied for long on Germany, even going to the extent of abandoning her
original tongue in favour of a Germanic dialect. One writer was responsible for
restoring to Denmark her intellectual dignity: this was Holberg, born in Norway
but a Dane by choice, who united the three countries by his talent and his power-
ful imagination. The unification of Sweden, Norway and Denmark from the 18th
century onwards is due to him and his works.

In the 18th century, this literary kinship, the bonds of the Hanseatic
League and the ties of Protestantism, combined to join these dissimilar countries.
If their spiritual vocation was the same, their temperaments were different. The
Danes proved to be admirable merchants; the Norwegians -- those at least who
had not the sea as their calling -- were proud to be peasant-farmers, and the Swedes,
excellent soldiers and very cultured, reigned in their castles and dreamed, under
the inspiring influence of Charles XII, of conquering Russia. These features of
Denmark, Sweden and Norway (not forgetting Finland, whose characteristics are
equally marked) still persist. Even today you can distinguish them as you travel
about, despite the changes of modern life and the wide influence exercised by the
New World over these young and lively countries.

Pause in Copenhagen, as I have often paused. How gay and fine Copenhagen
used to be, with its restaurants and orchestras, its sailing-ships and its green roofs!
Elegant Danish women, tall and lithe, seen from the terrace of the Hotel d'Angle-
terre; silverware and bright stuffs displayed in the shops -- the odours drifting
from the fish-market opposite the Exchange with its heraldic dragons -- what
memories for the traveller! And the Amalienborg Palace, from which King
Christian X used to emerge on spring afternoons to walk abroad like an ordinary
citizen. . . .

When you crossed the Sound and entered Sweden at Hälsingborg, you had to
travel a whole day or a night in the train to reach Stockholm. You ran through
spruce and pine forests, immense green stretches that today unfold rapidly, di-
minished in size, beneath the wings of your aircraft. Then you reached the waters
that hold and reflect the image of the magnificent city. Stockholm: "Venice of the
North!" This advertising slogan, an attractive catch-phrase, conveys a deceptive simil-
arity. In Venice, old palaces crumble beneath their paint and the waters are dead. In
Stockholm, the stone of the palaces is intact and the waters are alive. Who would
dream of bathing in Venice? In Stockholm there is a constant invitation to do so

-10-