No Danish ruler since the days of the great
Valdemars made such a mark upon his time; none lives as he in the
imagination of the people. He led armies to war and won and lost
battles; indeed, he lost more than he won on land when matched
against the great generals of that fighting era. On the sea he
sailed his own ship and was the captain of his own fleet, and there
he had no peer. He made laws in the days of peace and reigned over a
happy, prosperous land. In his old age misfortune in which he had no
share overwhelmed Denmark, but he was ever greatest in adversity,
and his courage saved the country from ruin. The great did not love
him overmuch; but to the plain people he was ever, with all his
failings, which were the failings of his day, a great, appealing
figure, and lives in their hearts, not merely in the dry pages of
musty books.
He was eleven years old when his father died, and until he came of
age the country was governed by a council of happily most able men
who, with his mother, gave him such a schooling as few kings have
had. He not only became proficient in the languages, living and
dead, and in mathematics which he put to such practical use that he
was among the greatest of architects and ship-builders; he was the
best all-round athlete among his fellows as well, and there was some
sense in the tradition that survives to this day that whoever was
touched by him in wrath did not live long, for he was very tall with
a big, strong body, and when he struck, he struck hard.
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