"Oh, lovely!" cried Mary Louise. "I've never met any kinds, although I've read about them in fairy stories."
"Come along then," said the mermaid. "Follow me straight down, for I think we are not very far from the Coral Palace, where King Seaphus holds court."
Placing the palms of her hands together diving fashion, she gave her pretty tail a kick-off, and away she went, head downward, through the water.
Mary Louise followed her example, somewhat surprised at the ease with which she executed this difficult maneuver.
In a short time they found themselves on the bottom of the ocean. In the distance could be seen the dim outline of a magnificent castle of pink and white coral. Leading up to it was a wide highway, flanked on either side with beautiful sea-grass, and dotted here and there, like milestones, stood columns of beautiful coral. Banks of exquisite mother-of-pearl rose at intervals along the way; water plants of various hues grew in wild profusion.
"Why, it's very much like the earth," exclaimed Mary Louise, "only one doesn't walk, and its not dusty, and—and it's not hot and sunny!"
"No, indeed!" said the mermaid. "But sometimes we have a pest of water gnats that are worse than mosquitoes, and we have to put up netting on our bedroom windows to keep them out."
As she finished speaking they approached the door of the castle, on which she knocked with a flap of her finny tail. It was immediately opened by a merman dressed in the uniform of a court page. "What can I do for you, Your Highness?" he asked, bowing low.
"Why, are you a princess?" asked Mary Louise in surprise, turning quickly to the mermaid and forgetting for the moment that they were on the steps of a real merman's castle.
The little mermaid only laughed in reply, and taking Mary Louise by the hand led her through the coral doors to King Seaphus.