When’ere a mermaid’s heart you hold in hand,

And four and forty men before me stand,

In place of all these geese I send as crew.

’Till then—‘O reservoir!’ my boy! adieu!”

Mona. Oh! what a dreadful man!

Prince Doodle.       He seized my brother;

And swore we ne’er again should see each other

Until this mermaid I should meet, so kind,

And then a mountain full of diamonds find.

The thing is absurd! There are no mermaids here,