"We make it. We grind coral into flour and mix it with fish eggs; then we put it in a shell and send a mermaid to the top of the ocean with it and she holds it in the sun until it bakes. We go to the Gulf Stream and gather grapes and we have sea-foam and lemonade to drink."
"Lemonade?" said Hilda. "Where do you get your lemons?"
"Why, the sea-lemon!" replied the mermaid; "that is a small mussel-fish the color of a lemon."
"What do you do at your parties--you cannot dance?" said Hilda.
"We swim to the music, circle around and dive and glide."
"But the music--where do you get musicians?" Hilda continued.
"We have plenty of music," replied the mermaid. "The sea-elephant trumpets for us; then there is the pipefish, the swordfish runs the scales of the sea-adder with his sword, the sea-shells blob, and altogether we have splendid music. But it is late, and we must not talk any more."
So the little mermaid curled herself up and soon they were asleep.
The sun shining in the window awakened Hilda next morning and she looked about her. The mermaid was not there, but Hilda was sure it had not been a dream, for she found pieces of seaweed on the floor, and every time she goes out in her boat she looks for her friend, and when the whales spout she knows they are telling the mermaids to come home.
