he kissed him again and longed that
he might live.

At last she saw dry land before her, high blue mountains on whose
summits the white snow glistened as if a flock of swans had settled
there; down by the shore were beautiful green woods, and in the
foreground a church or temple, she did not quite know which, but it was
a building of some sort. Lemon and orange trees grew in the garden, and
lofty palms stood by the gate. At this point the sea formed a little bay
where the water was quite calm, but very deep, right up to the cliffs;
at their foot was a strip of fine white sand to which she swam with the
beautiful prince, and laid him down on it, taking great care that his
head should rest high up in the warm sunshine.

The bells now began to ring in the great white building, and a number of
young maidens came into the garden. Then the little mermaid swam further
off behind some high rocks and covered her hair and breast with foam, so
that no one should see her little face, and then she watched to see who
would discover the poor prince.

[Illustration: _His limbs were numbed, his beautiful eyes were closing,
and he must have died if the little mermaid had not come to the
rescue._]

It was not long before one of the maidens came up to him. At first she
seemed quite frightened, but only for a moment, and then she fetched
several others, and the mermaid saw that the prince was coming to life,
and that he smiled at all those around him, but he never smiled at her.
You see he did not know that she had saved him. She felt so sad
that when he was led away into the great building she dived sorrowfully
into the water and made her way home to her father's palace.

Always silent and thoughtful, she became more so now than ever. Her
sisters often asked her what she had seen on her first visit to the
surface, but she never would tell them anything.

Many an evening and many a morning she would rise to the place where she
had left the prince. She saw the fruit in the garden ripen, and then
gathered, she saw the snow melt on the mountain-tops, but she never saw
the prince, so she always went home still sadder than before. At home
her only consolation was to sit in her little garden with her arms
twined round the handsome marble statue which reminded her of the
prince. It was all in gloomy shade now, as she had ceased to tend her
flowers, and the garden had become a neglected wilderness of long stalks
and leaves entangled with the