363 C 0 XE *3 TRAVELS IN NORWAY .

jio duty, unlefs opened for home confumption, and then are charged with the ufualfm-pofts.

The town contains three thoufand inhabitants ; the ftreets are airy ; the houfes arebuilt of wood painted red, and a few white.

On the fummit of an altnoft perpendicular rock, which overhangs the town, handsthe ftrong and hitherto impregnable fortrefs of Fredericsftein, rendered memorable bythe death of the northern lion, as Charles the Twelfth is fomeiimes emphatically ftyled.The fpot where he was killed, which was once marked by a pillar eredted by the Kingof Denmark, but pulled down at the requeft of the King of Sweden , is at the extremityof the Governor’s garden, at the bottom of the fteep rock, on which hands the fort ofGullenlowe. It was to me particularly interehing ; for it convinced me that a ftnaliball might have reached Charles, the dihance from the neareh bahion being not morethan five or fix hundred yards. Nor could I avoid remarking, that Motraye’s plan ofFredericshein and the adjacent batteries is in many parts extremely defective ; and fromthe belt information that I have collected, both his and Voltaire ’s account of the King’sdeath, and particularly of the wound which occafioned it, are very inaccurate.

But in order to obtain farther and more complete information concerning the pro-bable caufe of the death of'Charles, 1 called on Benk Enkelfon of Tiftedal, a Norwegian ,aged ninety-five, who was in his twenty-eighth year when he ferved as a gunner ofthe Danifh garrifon during the fiege of Fredericsftein. By means of a gentleman ofFredericlhall, who politely accompanied me to this old man’s houfe, and condefcendedto be my interpreter, I procured the following intelligence; which I (half give to thereader, in queftion and anfwer, as I obtained it.

Do you think that the King was {hot from the ramparts, or affaffinated by any of hisown troops ? From the ramparts undoubtedly. —What kind of (hot was fired againft theSwedilh trenches? All forts, and particularly ftnali fhot in cartouches from cannon.—Could the King, - in the place where he was, be reached by a fmall fhot? Tes, very:eafly ; as a fmall fhot could take effect at twice the difance. —Were many foldiers killednear him? Very many ; they fell about him like flraw, in fuch numbers that they were bu-ried on thefpot. 'The place was alfo fo much expojed to the fire from the ramparts , that theSwedes could not venture to work in the trenches by day, but only by night. —From whatfortrefs do you think Charles received hie death : from Oberberg, or from the citadel ?Certainly from the batteries of the citadel, which bore upo?i the place, and notfrom Oberberg ,from which it was defended by an intervening hill. I then ferved in thefortrefs of Oberberg /.and we did not that nightfire a Jinglefhotfrom thence *.

From this circumftantial evidence, given by a perfon who ferved in the garrifon ofFredericsftein at the time of the fiege, and who had no prejudices or intereft to bias ormiflead him, joined to my own obfervations on the fpot, I am convinced that Charlesmight have been eafily reached by a fmall ball from the ramparts of the citadel; andthat the confident affertions of thofe perfons who pretend that he could not be touchedby a mulket-ball, are totally groundlefs.

The queftion, therefore, in regard to the death of Charles, is now reduced to a fhortcompafs; and all the vague anecdotes and uncertain conjectures, which, without anyfoundation, attribute his death to affaffination, can weigh nothing againft pofitive fact jv

* This fhews thefalfity of Motraye’s account, which fays, that the King was {hot from the fortrefs of©berburgh. t See Book vii. Chap. 3.

Enkelfoa