224 SEA FABLES EXPLAINED. 



What, then, are these mermaids and mermen, a belief in 

 whose existence has prevailed in all ages, and amongst all 

 the nations of the earth ? Have they, really, some of the 

 parts and proportions of man, or do they belong to another 

 order of mammals on which credulity and inaccurate 

 observation have bestowed a false character ? 



Mr. Swainson, a naturalist of deserved eminence, has 

 maintained on purely scientific grounds, that there must 

 exist a marine animal uniting the general form of a fish 

 with that of a man ; that by the laws of Nature the nata- 

 torial type of the Quadrumana is most assuredly wanting, 

 and that, apart from man, a being connecting the seals 

 with the monkeys is required to complete the circle of 

 quadrumanous animals.* 



Mr. Gossef argues that all the characters which Mr. 

 Swainson selects as making the natatorial type of animals 

 belong to man, and that he being, in his savage state, a 

 great swimmer, is the true aquatic primate, which Mr. 

 Swainson regards as absent. Mr. Gosse admits, however, 

 that " nature has an odd way of mocking at our impossi- 

 bilities, and " that " it may be that green-haired maidens 

 with oary tails, lurk in the ocean caves, and keep mirrors 

 and combs upon their rocky shelves ;" and the conclusion 

 he arrives at is that the combined evidence "induces a 

 strong suspicion that the northern seas may hold forms of 

 life as yet uncatalogued by science." 



That there are animals in the northern and other seas 

 with which we are unacquainted, is more than probable 

 discoveries of animals of new species are constantly being 

 made, especially in the life of the deep sea but I venture 

 to think that the production of an animal at present 



* ' Geography and Distribution of Animals.' 

 t ' Romance of Natural History,' 2nd Series. 



