Fish and Their Fabulous Neighbors [187 



mermaids. Babylonian art dating from about 1800 B.C. depicts 

 mermaids, and only a century ago Barnum featured a "stuffed 

 mermaid" in his side show! The inquiring mind of a child plays, 

 naturally enough, with the idea of mermaids even if "no such 

 animal" is alive now, did it ever exist? If not, why were mermaids 

 "thought up"? 



The sea cow, a creature which, like the whale, is a sea-dwelling 

 mammal, probably gave rise to the mermaid legend. The sea 

 cow's head is shaped much like that of the seal; its body is plump 

 but somewhat fishlike. Its startling feature is its face, which sug- 

 gests an oversize, ugly human. It is believed that when early 

 navigators saw sea cows raise their heads above water, they were 

 struck by the animals' part human, part fishlike appearance. As 

 they did not have binoculars to help them see more clearly, they 

 reported these creatures as glamorous mermaids! 



SPONGES 



Boys and girls can learn something of life on the floor 

 of tropical seas by examining the natural (not synthetic) sponges. 

 The sponge, when it is alive and growing at the bottom of the 

 sea, looks more like a plant than an animal. There are many 

 varieties of sponges, but not all of them are used commercially as 

 some skeletons are too thin or scratchy or brittle. Sometimes the 

 skeletons become detached and float in on a beach. However, the 

 sponges destined for commercial use are obtained by divers or 

 by workers who pull them from the ocean floor with tongs fas- 

 tened to long poles. 



CORALS SEMI-PRECIOUS ORNAMENTS 



Another sea animal that children may know from its 

 skeleton is the coral. As in the case of sponges, there are many 

 varieties of corals. Aside from the type used for making necklaces 

 and ornaments, there are the reef-building, "stony" kind. These 

 are responsible for the well-known coral isles of the Pacific, as 

 well as the great coral reefs such as may be found near the 

 Bahamas and off the coast of Australia. The Great Barrier Reefs 

 off Australia are more than a thousand miles long and have 

 caused many a shipwreck. 



