fragments of the bridge are still floating in mid-
channel. Here was the tête-du-pont, a simple
breastwork with a few field-pieces, which, however,
effectually checked the Prussians after they
had stormed the Dybbol works, until the gallant
little Danish remnant had retreated across the
bridge. We could see the heights which were
crowned by the slight Danish defences, and we
saw also hundreds of Prussians at work on them
with pick and shovel, in contempt of the armistice
and of their own plighted word.

The "church battery" is formed along the
ridge on the north side of Sonderborg, which is
crowned by a church. It commands the strait,
but is itself on lower ground than, and
completely at the mercy of, any guns which the
Prussians may plant on Dybbol heights. In
each bastion, formed of earth and fascines, there
are two embrasures, occupied by an eighty-
pounder smooth bore about twenty years old
(Christian the Eighth marked on the trunnion),
and a twelve-pounder rifled field-gun. We
asked an artillery officer how long he thought
they would be able to hold the battery after the
Prussians opened fire upon them, and he replied,
"About eight hours." Like true patriots, these
gallant Danes are resolved to fight to the last in
defence of their country, though they know
well how overpowering are the odds that are
pitted against them.

Although the Prussian work at Sonderborg is
bad enough, yet the same signs of their shameful
cruelty are to be seen all along the shores of
Alsen Sound for a distance of six miles, from
Sonderborg to Ronnehaven. A drive to the
latter place is really like a drive in one of
the richest English counties in lovely spring
weather. There are hedges full of May, with
tall trees rising out of them, the same flowers
by the roadside, corn-fields, and bright green
beech woods. As we drove along, there were
occasional pretty glimpses of the narrow sound,
and the land of Sleswig beyond. Then a gable
would come in sight, and just as we expected
to see a prosperous looking farm-house, with
its haystacks and outbuildings, a scene of
horrible desolation would burst upon us. The
house gutted, the walls smashed, outbuildings
burnt, and naked gables standing out against
the sky. Most of the farms we passed in the
neighbourhood of Kjar were in this state; but
destruction on the largest scale had fallen on
the once rich and prosperous farm of Mr. Rosen,
at Ronnehaven. It stands on a hill overlooking
Alsen Sound, and consists of a large house ot
white bricks on granite foundations, with very
extensive farm buildings round two court-yards
in the rear. The machinery and all the
arrangements had been in the most improved
modern style of high farming. Behind the
farm buildings a kitchen garden stretches away
to the skirts of a wood of beech and alder trees,
and in front of the house a large pond was once
full of ducks and geese. The surrounding cornfields
and pastures completed the picture— a
scene of prosperous intelligent wealth in the
midst of a lovely rural landscape. Such was
Rosen's farm in 1863. Now it is a mass of
crumbling ruins: no sound is heard, no living
thing is seen. The Prussians poured in a storm
of shell with wanton barbarity, day after day,
until the whole place was reduced to ashes.
Not a shed, not even a dunghill had escaped.
a dead lamb was lying amidst a heap of burnt
straw, with a fragment of shell in its side.
Pieces of the death-dealing iron were lying about
in all directions, both in the buildings and in
the surrounding fields. We examined many of
these fragments, and also a whole shell which
had failed to burst, and we were surprised to
find that, in spite of all the talk about their
artillery, these Prussians are clumsy and
inefficient, even in their own devil's work. The
shells are conical, and bound round with hoops
of iron, apparently intended to keep the outer
coating of lead in its place, for they do not even
know how to attach lead to the iron chemically;
and of course it peels off after leaving the gun
and before the shell bursts, necessarily causing
considerable deflection. We saw this in the
case of the shell which had not burst. The lead
was stripped off in long strips half way down the
side, and projected from the surface of the shell.
Thus they do not effect their ravaging work by
the precision with which a few shells are thrown,
but by pouring great numbers in one direction
during several days, until at last the defenceless
homestead is burnt, or the desired
number of women and little children are torn to
pieces. It is a slight consolation to reflect that
their ghastly and clumsy work costs them about
thirty shillings for each shell that is fired.

A couple of fields below Rosen's farm the
Danes threw up a battery to command the
passage of the sound, at a point where the
Prussians collected several hundred boats in
which to effect a crossing. The Prussians
have batteries all along the sound, and a large
one at Schnabek, on the extreme northern end.
The coast of Sleswig is here well wooded and
very pretty. Immediately opposite the Danish
battery there is a handsome country-house, with
grassy lawn and gravel walks, belonging to
Count Raventlow, a traitor. The place is
called Sandberg, and here the Prussian flotilla
has been collected, the boats having been
brought by rail from all parts of Holstein and
Southern Sleswig.

In the rear of Ronnehaven, and close to the
shores of Augustenborg-fiord, is the palace of
the banished duke, now converted into a hospital
for the wounded. The Prussians opened fire
upon it on two occasions during the siege of
Dybbol, but it was fortunately out of range.
The palace itself is a huge barrack-like pile, but
behind it most beautiful beech woods slope
down to the shores of the fiord. These woods
were in the brightest spring verdure, the young
leaves in their richest green, and the rays of the
sun struck through them here and there in the
long vistas. The ground was carpeted with
violets and primroses, and in places thenre were
small thickets of alder. The Augustenburg
family forfeited this charming place— for which,