In the middle of the ocean, thousands of miles from any land, a great ship lay becalmed. It was a passenger ship, bound to the East Indies, and there were a good many families on board, and a still larger number of young men who had left their friends behind, and were going out to see if they could gather some of the famous “riches of the Indies” into their own pockets. Among these young men was one called Ernest, who not only had no relatives or near friends on board the ship, but, so far as he knew, in the wide world. Ever since he could remember he had been alone, and very lonely; nor did he feel less so now among all these persons, who each seemed to have some one to love or take an interest in them, except himself; and so still he was alone.
Day after day passed, and the ship lay becalmed, until the motionless heat became very oppressive. One night Ernest, strolling languidly up and down the deck, stopped, and, looking over the taffrail near the stern of the vessel, saw a little boat, which had been let down that one of the officers might bathe from it, and which still lay rocking gently on the little waves; so Ernest, thinking it would be a pleasant place to lie and dream, clambered down the side of the great ship, and, stretching himself upon a cloak in the bottom of the boat, soon fell fast asleep.
Some hours passed, and then Ernest awoke with a start, for a great wave had broken over his little skiff and drenched him with water. Sitting upright, he looked about him in silent amazement. During the night the wind had suddenly risen, and in a few hours increased to a gale. On board the ship, the sailors who were keeping watch had set the great sails, glad enough to see them fill once more. But no one had remembered or noticed the little boat towing astern, which, after following quietly on for awhile, pulling harder and harder upon the slender line which held it to the ship, suddenly snapped it in two, and in a moment was left far behind.
So now, when Ernest sat up and looked about him, he saw nothing but water; on every side, great black waves with white, foamy crests, came rolling angrily toward him, as if they would swallow him up; and some of them, like the one which had awakened him, even broke into the little boat, so that for some time Ernest was too busy in baling out the water to have time even to be frightened.
The rest of the night passed in this manner; but just before sunrise the wind died away to little and less, until, as the first level rays shot across the ocean, the calm was as intense as it had been the day before.
The waves continued restless some hours longer; but before noon they too had sunk to sleep, and the little boat with the lonely youth remained motionless, the centre of a great, round water-plain extending on every side to where the burning sky dipped down, trying in vain to cool itself.
For many hours Ernest had suffered terribly from heat and thirst, and now that the utter calm increased both, he thought he must surely die. Wrapping himself again in the thick cloak, and covering his head from the blistering rays of the sun, he lay many hours motionless in a sort of swoon. When he recovered consciousness, night had come again; the fierce sun had given way to the cool, pitying moon, which, round and full, beamed kindly down upon him; and a little breath of air, not enough to make the gentlest breeze, just rippled the surface of the water, and gave a faint, delightful motion to the little boat.
Ernest, faint and exhausted, sat up and looked about him. The scene was delightful, but he hardly knew it, his sufferings from thirst and fever were so intense; he looked toward the east and shuddered,--a few hours more and the sun would rise, burning and scorching all before him, and Ernest felt that then he must die.
With a low moan he stretched himself again in the bottom of the boat, and lay there still, with half-closed eyes, listening to the soft ripple of the tiny wavelets upon the side, and soothed by the faint motion of the little skiff.
Suddenly he perceived that this motion had increased; that it had become a gentle, regular rocking, although the noise of the water against the side was rather less than more. Raising his languid eyes, what was Ernest’s astonishment to see a row of little white hands clasping the edge of the boat on each side, and rocking it as if it were a cradle. Softly putting out his own hand, Ernest cautiously touched one of those nearest to him; yes, they were real fingers,--cool, white, and soft.
Rising upon his elbow, the young man peeped over the gunwale of his boat. Oh, what a singular picture met his view! The world beneath the sea had come up to visit the world above the sea. Strange, beautiful fishes, such as no man’s eye ever saw before, glittered and swam on every side; great whales, white as milk, too cautious ever to appear by day, moved in stately measure beneath the moon; the sea-serpent undulated his miles of glossy length, coiling himself up, and suddenly whirling into the air and down again in a great, gleaming arch to the water; far away in lonely grandeur, vast, white, and motionless, lay the great Kraken, that mysterious, traditional inhabitant of the sea, only known to men through the wild stories which ancient mariners will sometimes tell around the evening fire. Wonderful enough it was to see all these; but Ernest hardly glanced at them,--for, close about his boat on every side crowded beautiful forms, with fair, childlike faces and long, golden hair, which floated and glittered upon the moon-lit waves, as they swam gracefully hither and thither. Ernest knew them at once; they were the mer-maidens, the children of the sea, of whom he had often heard, and for whom he had often vainly gazed across the midnight ocean.
These it were, who, grasping with white fingers the little boat, had rocked it softly to the cadence of an inarticulate song. As the youth arose and looked at them, they gently loosed their hold, and sunk beneath the water; but in an instant he heard them again behind him, and, turning suddenly, saw them surrounding a great sea-shell, white without, and of an exquisite pink within, which they were softly moving on across the water toward his own boat, while they sung in unison their mysterious, wordless song. But Ernest neither looked nor listened to the mer-maidens, for within the shell, robed in the rich abundance of her own golden hair, reclined the loveliest creature that the youth had ever seen, with fair, pale face and great, dreamy eyes, blue as the sea itself. Upon her head was set a crown, and about her neck and arms were strings of enormous pearls, perfect in form and color, and yet no whiter or rounder than the throat and arms which they encircled.
In her hands she carried a little golden harp, and when she had approached within a few feet of Ernest’s boat, gently motioning her maidens to pause, she raised it and swept her tiny hand across the strings; a faint, sweet sound, like summer wind sighing through summer woods, met the young man’s ear, and then in a soft, low voice she sung. The words were in the same unknown tongue with which the mer-maidens had chanted his lullaby, but as Ernest listened they shaped themselves into meaning in his mind; and this was the song of the sea-princess:--
Come with me! Come with me!
To the world beneath the sea.
There live we, with mirth and glee,
Oh, ’tis pleasant there to be!
Pearls so rare, jewels fair,
Gather we to deck our hair;
Toil nor care, dwell not there,
Come then, mortal, if thou dare!
The song was repeated over and over, and each moment Ernest longed more to go and dwell in this fair world beneath the sea. At last the shell-boat was pushed close to his own; and all the little white hands of the mer-maidens, clasping one side of his skiff, tipped it more and more, until half unconsciously he slid from his own to the boat of the beautiful maiden, who clasped him in her arms, murmuring her soft song dreamily into his ear, while the great pink shell began first slowly, then more and more swiftly, to spin round and round, sinking at the same time until it was countless fathoms beneath the sea.
Ernest awoke as from a dream, to find himself laid upon a couch of soft, many colored sea-mosses, heaped high in the centre of a grotto-like chamber, whose walls of red and white coral were curiously cut, by the labor of the sword-fish employed as decorator in the royal palace, into the delicate and fanciful images of all the beautiful flowers and leaves which grow far beneath the sea, and are never seen by men. A cool, green light diffused itself through the chamber, and showed to Ernest the figure of the princess seated beside him, and gazing at him with loving eyes.
“What is your name, fair queen?” asked the young man softly.
“I am the Princess Su-le-mair, daughter of the great King Maro,” replied the maiden, a little proudly; but added, in a more tender voice, “And you, beautiful mortal,--what do they call you, above there?”
“My name is Ernest; but no mortal will ever call me so again, for I will live here always with you, beautiful Sulemair,” and the youth timidly kissed the rose-red lips of the fair sea-maiden.
“Then come with me and see our palace,--your home, now,” said Sulemair, bashfully drawing back, but holding out her cool, white hand to take that of her lover.
So Ernest went, guided by the princess, from one curious and beautiful room to another, until he had seen all the wonders of the palace in which he was now to dwell. Then Sulemair proposed that he should come with her to see her father and mother, who lived at some distance; for each of the princes and princesses had a palace to themselves; and as the royal family was very large, the king was obliged to keep a large corps of sword-fish coral-cutters constantly at work.
The young couple found that King Maro was just presiding at his council table, so that he could not receive them; but Queen Nymphia, Sulemair’s mother, professed herself very much pleased with their visit, and welcomed Ernest to the kingdom under the sea very warmly and gracefully.
After this, it being dinner time, the two returned to their own palace, and spent the rest of the day very happily in telling each other the history of their previous lives.
So the days went dreamily on. Sometimes Sulemair sung to her golden harp love-songs, or ballads of sea-life; sometimes she and her maidens danced with Ernest, who soon learned their strange and fanciful figures, while a band of conchs, carefully graduated in tone, played each on his own shell; sometimes the princess, or one of the maidens, told strange stories of wonderful sights and romantic adventures in their own country, to which Ernest replied with stories of the world above the sea, which made the mer-maidens open their blue eyes wide with astonishment.
These and other amusements filled the day; yet sometimes Ernest would find time to wonder if matters went on above as they had done in his own time, and to wish occasionally that he and Sulemair could make a little visit to earth, just to see how it looked once more. He never mentioned this fancy to his beautiful bride, however, lest she should think him discontented; but keeping it to himself, he dwelt upon it more and more, until at last he thought of hardly any thing else, and at times was so absent and dreamy that he forgot to listen to the songs and stories, or to dance when it was his turn to do so.
Sulemair was not slow to notice and to suspect the cause of this alteration in her beloved Ernest, and she, too, grew silent, thoughtful, and abstracted. At last, one day, Ernest, rousing suddenly from a reverie, found the princess seated beside him gazing into his face, while great tears, rolling down her cheeks and dropping off her chin, fell in round, white pearls at her feet.
“Dearest, sweetest, what is the matter?” asked Ernest, anxiously; for he had never seen the princess cry before.
“It is--it is, that Ernest wishes to leave me,” sobbed the poor little sea-nymph.
“Leave you! leave my Sulemair!” exclaimed Ernest, kissing her over and over; “I never dreamed of such a thing. But if you and I together, dearest, could make just a little visit up above,--eh, Susu?”
“Listen, dear,” said the princess, sitting up, and wiping her eyes; “for I have something to tell you. I never can visit the world above and return here--never. But I have one chance to exchange this life for that, if I choose, though I never thought of wishing it before. Are you sure, very sure, dear Ernest, that you wish me to come too? Will it not be enough if you can return alone? Perhaps, after a while, you would grow tired of your poor Sulemair, and then what should she do, all alone in a strange world?”
It required several words and a great many kisses to convince the princess of the absurdity of this idea; but at last she continued:--
“We daughters of the royal house have a privilege not shared by any other of the maidens of the sea. On the night we are sixteen (our birthdays always come in the full moon), if we can by any means persuade a mortal maiden to leap into the sea, and catch her in our arms as she falls, we are able to change conditions with her,--she becoming a mer-maiden, and we a child of earth. This is possible, but rarely attempted by us; partly because we love our own natures so well we do not care to change, and partly from the difficulty of inducing any earthly maiden to make the exchange. Sometimes, however, one of us has done it; my eldest sister did. She ascended to the upper waters on her birth-night, and found herself near a ship moving slowly through the sea; floating quietly about it she perceived a beautiful girl leaning over the side, and looking sadly into the water. My sister, who had a harp like mine, began to play and sing softly, and the maiden, fixing her eyes upon the spot where my sister’s hair, floating behind her, looked like what the sailors call a moon-glade, drooped lower and lower over the side of the vessel, until Neria, holding out her arms, the maiden sunk into them, and in the next moment floated away a mer-maiden, while my sister clambered into the ship and took her place.”
“But did they look alike?” asked Ernest.
“Oh, the two change faces as well as forms, you understand.”
“But then you would not be my Sulemair any more,” said Ernest, discontentedly.
“Foolish boy, you will find some one so much more beautiful to take my place, that you will be glad to make the change,” said the princess, laughing merrily.
“I shall find, little Susu? What does that mean?” asked the lover.
“Why, my plan is, that you shall return immediately to the earth, and spend the time from now to my birthday, which will not be for ten more full moons, in trying to find a maiden (a beautiful one, mind--I won’t change with an ugly one), who will leap into the sea of her own freewill. I don’t think it right to charm one, as Neria did, although I dare say I could”--
“As you charmed me,” suggested Ernest.
“No, I didn’t charm you, I only sung to you,” replied Sulemair innocently.
“All the same; but go on with your little plan, darling.”
“Well, if you can find one who will change with me willingly, bring her to a place which I will show you, the night of the tenth full moon from that now shining; let her leap into my arms, and the next moment you will have me, a mortal maiden, ready to live and die with you in your own way.”
“Let me set out immediately,” exclaimed Ernest, starting up, “I shall find not one, but twenty maidens, with whom to purchase my Sulemair’s life.”
“Not twenty, but one will be enough,” smiled the princess, as, winding her arms about Ernest, she floated with him to the surface of the ocean, directing her course obliquely, as if to reach some particular point. Emerging at length, they found themselves near the shore, and directly opposite a high cliff of peculiar shape, which overhung the water like a petrified cataract.
“There, Ernest,” said the princess, pointing at the cliff, “you see that--we call it ‘the frozen fall’--now if you can find a maiden willing to exchange with me, bring her there, and let her leap, just as the moon reaches the summit of the heavens, into my arms, which shall be open to catch her. Farewell till then.”
And Sulemair, with a little laugh and a playful gesture, sunk beneath the surface and was gone immediately. Ernest would have followed, to assure her once more that he would certainly return; but to his surprise he found the water, which had so long been like a native element to him, had suddenly become a foreign one, and he was obliged to swim vigorously to gain the shore, which, while he was floating with Sulemair, had seemed so near and easy of access.
Once landed, Ernest immediately set out upon his strange search. He travelled far and wide, and tried to persuade many beautiful maidens to change their earthly condition for a life beneath the sea. But some laughed in his face, some told him he was a madman who should be shut up, some shuddered, and said they were frightened at the very idea, and some tried to persuade him to stay with them instead.
So one month after another slipped away, until the tenth moon had grown from a crescent to half its full size, and still the maiden was not found.
Gloomy and despairing, Ernest had almost abandoned hope; and one day finding himself in a thick wood just outside a great city, he threw himself upon the ground, and covering his face with his hands, began to lament and groan aloud; but after a while, his grief becoming a little calmer, he lay quite still and quiet; to his great surprise, however, the sounds of lamentation still echoed through the stillness of the wood, as if the very trees were mourning with him. Thinking that this could hardly be the case, Ernest looked about him in every direction, and presently perceived at a little distance a female figure seated upon the ground, her face covered with her hands, and her whole form shaken with the violence of her grief.
Full of compassion and some little curiosity, Ernest arose, and approaching the stranger, asked kindly what was the matter with her. Looking up, with a little startled cry, the mourner showed the face of a young girl, with so striking resemblance to Sulemair, that the lover uttered an exclamation of astonishment; but without heeding this, the young girl said sadly,--
“You ask what is the matter, sir, that I thus weep and lament. I will tell you; for you look kind and good. My father, whom they call a traitor, though no man is less so, is to be beheaded at sunrise to-morrow, and I shall be left alone in the wide world.” Saying this, she burst into fresh tears and sobs. Ernest sat down beside her, and when her grief had a little subsided, told her how sorry he felt for her, and that if he could in any way help her or her father, he would do so. Then he told her his own story, and asked if she could help him.
Veria (this was the maiden’s name) listened attentively to Ernest’s story, and when he had finished, sat for a moment thinking. Then, holding out her hand to the youth, she said,--
“I will be the maiden for whom you search, Ernest, if you will find means to save my father’s life. Gladly will I give mine for his; and if I can make you and Sulemair happy at the same time, it will be so much the more joy. Will you try, Ernest?”
“I will try, Veria,” said the young man, sadly; for he did not quite like the idea, after all, of seeing Veria throw herself into the sea, and become a mer-maiden.
Nevertheless, he rose, and walked quickly toward the city, leaving the maiden still weeping in the wood.
Having engaged a lodging at a small inn near the city gate, Ernest mingled with a group of men at the door of the inn, who were busily talking in a low voice, and who did not notice that a stranger had joined them.
“But what will they do for an executioner to-morrow,” said one, “since Vincent cannot be found?”
“Do you suppose some of Hugo’s friends hired him to run away, that the execution might be deferred?” asked another.
“Like enough,” responded a third; “and if it could be put off altogether, I don’t think any one would be sorry; for, after all, what has this Hugo done, to have his head chopped off? There are more worse than better men, I’ll be bound.”
“Yes,” said the first cautiously, “and I, for my part, would gladly help to set him free, if it could be done.”
“Aye,” responded the second, “but how is that to be accomplished?”
“I will tell you, good friends,” interrupted Ernest, “I will set him free, if you will only help me.”
“You, young man? How will you do it?”
“Come close to me, and I will tell you my plan.”
The citizens crowded about Ernest, who in a very low voice told them a plan which had just occurred to him, and which they all agreed was an excellent one. Each promised to help him in every way that he should point out, and all kept their word.
That very night Ernest presented himself to the governor of the city as an executioner from another town, who was willing to take the place of Vincent, the missing officer, who had suddenly disappeared. The governor asked, of course, for his certificates of character and ability, but Ernest was ready for him; for his good friends of the tavern had provided him with papers, which, if not quite as genuine, were just as good looking as any executioner could have shown.
The governor read all the papers carefully, examined the signatures, asked Ernest a good many questions, and finished by engaging him, offering to pay him half the price for which they agreed in advance; but Ernest, who was too honest to take money for work which he never meant to do, said he preferred to wait, and have it altogether.
The next morning at sunrise was the time appointed, and a great crowd had collected to witness the execution; but Ernest saw with pleasure that his new friends had contrived to get places next the scaffold, and all looked determined and ready.
Presently the criminal, Hugo, as he was called, was brought from the interior of the prison, and Ernest felt a double longing to save him when he saw how much he resembled Veria.
Making a pretence of arranging his dress that it might not interfere with the blow, he whispered rapidly that he was no executioner, but was there to save him; and as he stood close behind him he slyly cut the cords which bound Hugo’s arms, and, slipping a strong knife into his hand, bid him do just as he did.
Hugo, although startled for a moment, soon recovered his self-possession, and, in a whisper, said he was ready.
Then Ernest, springing from the scaffold into the midst of the group of friends who were waiting for him, brandished his axe about his head, crying,--
“Rescue! rescue! Good men, rescue!”
Hugo, flourishing his knife, and crying out, “Help! friends, help!” followed immediately; and the little group, each of whom drew a knife, a dagger, a pistol, or some other weapon, closed about them, all crying, “Rescue! rescue!” which induced many others to join them.
More than this, the people, who all wished well to Hugo, made way for him and his friends to pass, but closed up when the soldiers tried to follow them, which caused much delay and vexation to the pursuers. Reaching the city gates, Hugo, Ernest, and one or two others, rushed out, and their friends, snatching the keys from the astonished guard, locked the gates, and threw the keys over the wall; then, hiding their weapons and mingling in the crowd, they escaped unrecognized.
The little group outside meantime had gained the wood, where horses were waiting for them; and Hugo, with one hurried kiss and good-by to Veria (who also was there waiting for him), mounted with one or two friends and rode off at full speed, and that same night left the country forever.
Ernest and Veria, at the same time mounting the two remaining horses, set out in another direction, and when the angry soldiers from the city had at last forced the gate and reached the forest, they found it silent and deserted; nor did they ever again see one of the fugitives.
Ernest and Veria, saying but little to each other, and both exceedingly sorrowful, rode all that day, and the next, and the next, until, the very evening when the tenth full moon was rising majestically from the sea, they turned loose their exhausted horses at the foot of the cliff which Sulemair had named the Frozen Fall.
Silently the two climbed the cliff, until they had nearly reached its crest, and then, Ernest motioning his companion to seat herself on a flat, gray rock which lay there, threw himself at her feet, and, looking up in her face, said,--
“Veria, I will not have it so. Why are you to sacrifice yourself that Sulemair should be happy? She has never known any other life than that beneath the sea, and she will soon forget me and her wild dream of becoming a mortal. I will stay with you, Veria, and we shall all be happy in our own way.”
Veria smiled sadly in the moonlight.
“No, Ernest,” said she, “I have bought my father’s life, and I will pay the price. Sulemair trusted you, and brought you back to earth that you might win for her the means of living always with you. Shall we be so base as to deceive and defraud her?”
Ernest, covering his face, groaned aloud, but did not speak; nor did either utter another word until the moon, sailing slowly through the calm, blue ocean of heaven, stood in the zenith smiling down at the twin moon, which smiled up to her from the ocean of waters beneath.
Then Veria, rising, pointed upward, and said softly,--
“Ernest, do you see?”
The young man slowly raised his pale face and looked. Veria, standing on the very verge of the cliff, the soft night wind floating back her snow-white dress and golden hair, her hands clasped and raised, as were her soft eyes, to heaven,--stood ready for the leap.
Below, gazing up at her, as the moon below gazed up to the moon above, floated Sulemair; her white form gleaming through the still water, her yellow hair floating out upon the waves, her snowy arms extended upward.
“Veria, Veria, stay!” shouted the young man in agony.
“Veria, Veria, come!” floated up from the water like a mocking echo, in the silvery voice of Sulemair.
Ernest sprung forward; but Veria, with one wild glance backward, leaped from the cliff, and was clasped in the white arms of Sulemair.
Mechanically, more with the idea of saving Veria than of greeting her rival, Ernest rushed down the path leading to the beach, and stood a moment, with the little laughing waves curling and plashing round his feet.
A white, floating figure rose to the surface, and was borne gently toward him;--plunging in, the young man swam toward her, reached her, and drew her out. Then, standing on the moon-lit beach, he gazed in astonishment at the being beside him. Fair and golden-haired, she had the dove-like, spiritual eyes of Veria, but the laughing, rose-red mouth and dimpled cheek of Sulemair. Upon her head and neck and arms shone the crown and pearls of the sea-princess, but her form was clothed in the modest garments of the earth-maiden. All that he had loved, all that was best and dearest of each, was there. Who was it?
“Veria!--Sulemair!” stammered Ernest. “Which are you? What does this mean? Speak to me!”
“Dear Ernest!” said a voice as true and loving as Veria, as arch and playful as Sulemair, “I am both,--all. What each wanted, the other possessed,--I am the childlike, frolicsome mer-maiden joined to the true heart and immortal soul of Veria. When we clasped our arms about each other, the heart of each leaped to meet that of the other; in a moment we were one,--two in one. Do you like me, Ernest?”
“Like you, my queen, my angel?” exclaimed the youth, clasping her to his heart; “I love you with twofold love. All my old love for Sulemair, all my new love for Veria, has mingled in my heart, as you two have mingled soul and body; and my love is as much stronger for you than for either of those, as you now are more perfect and more charming than either half could have been alone.”
“But my name?” murmured the maiden, “what will you call me, now that I have lost both those which I bore before?”
“I will call you Una now, for you are perfect--you are one,--a woman; and can be no better, no higher.”
And the moon beamed, and the wavelets crisped in her pure light at their feet; and their hearts had room for no more joy.
