MERMEN AVD wreKMAIUS. 289 



and recorded, that " he appeared like an old man, 

 strong-limbed, with broad shoulders, but his arms 

 they could not see. His head was small in propor- 

 tion to his body, and had short curled black hair, 

 which did not reach below his ears ; his eyes lay 

 deep in his head, and he had a meagre face, with a 

 black beard : about the body and downwards this 

 Merman was quite pointed like a fish."* 



As illustrating the habits, and still more as bear- 

 ing on the voice, a noted power of these strange 

 creatures, thus distinguished by the great dramatist 

 with not less fancy than fable 



I heard a Mermaid on a dolphin's bacK 

 Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, 

 That the rude sea grew civil at her song 



We shall transcribe the account of two incidents 

 which were observed in the Southern Hemisphere. 

 " A very singular circumstance happened," says 

 Captain Colnett, " off the coast of Chili, in lat. 24 S., 

 which, as it spread some alarm among my people, 

 and awakened their superstitious apprehensions, I 

 shall mention. About eight o'clock in the evening 

 an animal rose alongside the ship, and uttered such 

 shrieks and tones of lamentation, so much like 

 those produced by the female human voice when ex- 

 pressing the deepest distress, as to occasion no 

 small degree of alarm among those who first heard 

 i* These cries continued for upwards of three 



* Pontopildon's Nat. Hist, of Norway, p. 154. 



