"I got on much farther north," said the Polar Bear porter, fanning
himself with a large sea shell. "Gracious me, but it's dreadfully hot
down here."

"This Caribbean Sea is as full of mountains as New Hampshire and
Vermont are, but none of them have caps of snow like that which Mount
Washington sometimes wears," said the Mermaid Princess. "Snow wouldn't
last a second under this hot sun."

"Where did you learn all this?" asked Mary Louise.

"Oh, I went to the Coral School for Girls," answered the Mermaid
Princess, and she sighed, for she suddenly remembered she was a long
way from home.

Just then the little Star Fish met a soft little body, much smaller
than himself, who invited him to visit her relatives, who live, by
millions, in this mountain region.

So off they started for Coraltown, where this little Miss Polyp lived.

Her father and mother, brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts, were all
polyps. They had built the coral islands by fastening themselves to
the tops of the mountains under the sea, year after year, and at last
their soft bodies had turned into stone. And now you know how these
millions of little polyps finally made the small islands that dotted
the surface of the water.

After the Star Fish and his little friend had swum away, Mary Louise
spied a boat drifting toward them. So she and the Mermaid Princess
scrambled inside, and the polar Bear porter hoisted a sail, which he
found wrapped around a mast in the bottom of the boat.

"Hip, hurrah, we're off once more,"
Shouted the Polar Bear, waving his paw,
And the Mermaid Princess laughed in glee
As he held the tiller and sailed o'er the sea!

By and by the air became colder and the Mermaid said:

"We must be near my father's castle. I think I'll slip into the ocean
and swim home."

"Before you go, please comb my hair with your magic comb so that I may
be a little girl again," begged Mary Louise; "I don't want to be a
mermaid forever."

As soon as the magic pearl comb touched Mary Louise's hair her tail
changed into her own little pair of legs.

"Now kiss me good-by," said the little Mermaid Princess, and, with a
splash, she disappeared in the ocean.

Wonderland

For a few minutes Mary Louise felt quite lonely. Presently she asked
the Polar Bear to be kind enough to land her on the nearest shore.

At once the big kind animal trimmed in his sail and before long they
entered a beautiful bay whose dark waters wer