care. If I had my way they'd be compelled to
fence in their routes all the way over, and station signal-men in boats
at road crossings to warn us of impending danger. Why, if it hadn't been
for our own police, police that we have to pay ourselves, you and I
would have been run down just now."

"You don't mean to say you have police out here on the ocean?" said
Jimmieboy.

"Yes," said the merboy; "several of 'em. In fact, we have about a
million of 'em altogether. You land people call 'em porpoises. Ever see
a porpoise?"

"Lots of them," Jimmieboy replied. "They come up our river sometimes,
and papa has told me lots of stories about them, but he never said they
were policemen."

"They aren't police-_men_," laughed the merboy. "They are police-fish.
What did he ever tell you about them?"

"Oh--well--he said he'd seen schools of them jumping about in the water
when he was crossing the ocean on one of those big boats," said
Jimmieboy; "and one of them, he said, followed his ship for four days
one time. The reason why I remember about it particularly is that he
told me, maybe, if I would be a very good boy, he'd try to get me one
for a pet that I could tie a chain to and lead around when we went
rowing some time."

The merboy laughed.

"The idea!" he said. "As if a porpoise could be treated like a poodle!
That shows how little you land people know about porpoises. Did your
father say they went about in schools?"

"That's what he told me," said Jimmieboy, meekly. "Don't they?"

"Humph!" said the merboy. "Don't they! Well, let me tell you one thing.
Don't you ever let a porpoise hear you say he goes about in schools.
Leave schools to minnows and moss-bunkers and children. Why, my dear
boy, porpoises know too much to go about in schools. They'd be much more
likely to go about in colleges, if they went in anything of the sort.
Didn't you ever hear the story of the Porpoise and the Land-sage?"

"I never did." Jimmieboy answered. "I never heard of a land-sage either.
What is a land-sage?"

"A land-sage is a creature like a man. In fact, he is a man, and he
lives on the land, and thinks he knows everything, when in reality he
only knows land things."

"But isn't it good to know land things?" Jimmieboy asked.

"Oh yes--in a way," said the merboy, patronizingly. "But just because
you know land things doesn't make you the wisest thing in the world.
It's a great deal better to know sea things, because if you know sea