The danger of an invasion was
averted. In the palace of Rosenborg the priceless treasure they show
to visitors is the linen cloth, all blood-stained, that bound the
King's face as he fought and won his last and biggest fight that
day.
Half blind, his body black and blue and sore from many bruises, King
Christian yet refused to sail for Copenhagen to have his wounds
attended. Three weeks he lay watching the narrow inlet behind which
the beaten enemy was hiding, to destroy his ships when he came out.
Then he gave over the command to another and hastened to the
province of Skaane on the Swedish mainland, from which he expelled a
hostile army. But when his back was turned, the men he had set to
watch fell asleep and let the Swedish admiral steal out into the
open. There he found and joined the Dutch ships that had slipped
around the Skaw during the rumpus. Together they overwhelmed the
Danish fleet, being now three to one, and crushed it. The slothful
admiral paid for it with his life, but the harm was done. It was the
last and heaviest blow. The old King sheathed his sword and set his
name to a peace that took from Denmark some of her ancient
provinces, with the bitter sigh: "God knows I had no share in this,"
and he had not.
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