"Can't you love? Don't you know
about souls and being good, and all that?"

"No," laughed the mermaids, shaking their heads till the drops flew
about like pearls. "We have no souls, and don't trouble about being
good. We sing and swim and eat and sleep; is not that enough to make us
happy?"

"Dear me, how queer they are!" thought Nelly, half afraid, yet very
anxious to go with them and see more of this curious sea-life of which
they had spoken. "Don't you care about me at all, and don't you want me
to stay with you a little while?" she asked, wondering how she should
get on with creatures who could not love her.

"Oh yes, we like you as a new playmate, and are glad you came to see us.
You shall have our bracelets to wear, and we will show you all kinds of
pretty things down below, if you are not afraid to come," answered the
mermaids, dressing her in their garlands and necklaces, and smiling at
her so sweetly that she was ready to follow as they swam away with her
far out on the great billows that tossed them to and fro but could not
drown or harm them now.

Nelly enjoyed it very much, and wondered why the fishermen in their
boats did not try to catch them, till she learned that mermaids were
invisible and were never caught. This made her feel very safe, and
after a fine game of play she let her friends take her by the hand and
sink down to the new world below. She expected to find it very gay and
splendid, with sea-coral trees growing everywhere, palaces of pearl, and
the ground covered with jewels; but it was dim and quiet. Great weeds
fanned to and fro as the water stirred them; shells lay about on the
sand, and queer creatures crawled or swam everywhere.

The green sea-water was the sky, and ships cast their shadows like
clouds over the twilight world below. Several gray-bearded old mermen
sat meditating in nooks among the rocks, and a few mermaids lay asleep
in the great oyster-shells that opened to receive them and their beds of
sea-weed. A soft murmur was in the air like the sound one hears in
shells, and nowhere did Nelly see any toys or food or fun of any sort.

"Is this the way you live?" she asked, trying not to show how
disappointed she was.

"Isn't it lovely?" answered Goldfin. "This is my bed, and you shall have
the shell between Silver-tail and me. See! it is lined with
mother-of-pearl, and has a soft cushion of our best sea-weeds to lie
on."

"Are you hungry?" asked Silver-tail. "Come and have