l to pieces. In the first half of the
Nineteenth Century, when national feeling and national pride were at
their lowest ebb, it was taken down with other moth-eaten old
banners, one day when they were cleaning up, and somebody made a
bonfire of them in the street. Such was the fate of "the flag that
fell from heaven," the sacred standard of the Danes. But it was not
the end of it. The Dannebrog flies yet over the Denmark of the
Valdemars, no longer great as then, it is true, nor master of its
ancient foes; but the world salutes it with respect, for there was
never blot of tyranny or treason upon it, and its sons own it with
pride wherever they go.

King Valdemar knighted five and thirty of his brave men on the
battle-field, and from that day the Order of the Dannebrog is said
to date. It bears upon a white crusader's cross the slogan of the
great fight "For God and the King," and on its reverse the date when
it was won, "June 15, 1219." The back of paganism was broken that
day, and the conversion of all Esthland followed soon. King Valdemar
built the castle he had begun before he sailed home, and called it
Reval, after one of the neighboring tribes. The Russian city of that
name grew up about it and about the church which Archbishop Anders
reared. The Dannebrog became its arms, and its people call it to
this day "the city of the Danes."

Denmark was now at the height of her glory. Her flag flew over all
the once hostile lands to the south and east, clear into Russia. The
Baltic was a Danish inland sea. King Valdemar was named "Victor"
with cause. His enemies feared him; his people adored him. In a
single night foul treachery laid the whole splendid structure low.
The King and young Valdemar, Dagmar's son, with a small suite of
retainers had spent the day hunting on the little island of Lyoe.
Count Henrik of Schwerin,--the Black Count they called him,--who had
just returned from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, was his guest. The
count hated Valdemar bitterly for some real or fancied injury, but
he hid his hatred under a friendly bearing and smooth speech. He
brought the King gifts from the Holy Sepulchre, hunted with him, and
was his friend. But by night, when the King and his son slept in
their tent, unguarded, since no enemy was thought to be near, he
fell upon them with his cutthroats, bound and gagged them despite
their struggles, and gathering up all the valuables that lay around,
to put the finishing touch upon h