Well, it is almost sad to think that any one could be so foolish, yet when Folks know but little, they will catch up strange notions and listen to silly signs without an atom of truth or common sense in them. So some ignorant Folks once believed that a witch, or some witchy Folk with an evil eye, might look upon them and cause them harm, or make them meet some danger.
And they pretended that hanging a bit of coral somewhere about them would keep off a look from "the evil eye," and that making children wear a piece of it would charm away sickness and act as a medicine. Now did you ever!
Chinese Folks and Hindoos have made most exquisite and wonderful carvings of the coral of the Mediterranean, and there is such a thing as black coral, also known as brain coral, but it is too brittle to be worked upon.
Ah, who would not be a Dolphin, merry and free, whisking through deep, still water, coasting over coral sands, and diving and sporting through coral groves!
Nor is this the only rare and curious place through which I rove, chasing my comrades, wandering about in search of caverns below, and sweet music above, while forever making war on my enemy, the flying-fish.
You see, these fish can cut through the water, reach the surface, then really fly with finny wings across short spaces right in the air. They think themselves smart, and are great braggarts.
One morning a flying-fish was bent on worrying me, swishing its flapping fins directly before my face, then darting upward, sending the spray cross-wise into my eyes. I made a snap or two at the vexing creature, but as I missed him he became bolder, and stopped a race I was having with one of my mates.
Suddenly I made a great leap after the flier, but up he went, up, up, and I after him, sharp! Further up he went, and I pursued. He laughed, fish-fashion, his big mouth sprawling way across his face as he sped above the surface.
I poked my nose into upper air and saw which way he was going, and to my joy he made a dip just as up went my beak again, and I had him, squeezed securely between my jaws.
Of all the wriggling and squirming, the begging and the pleading that ever you saw or heard! But I did not want to eat him, nor did I mean to kill him, either. But I did mean to teach old Mister Flier a lesson, showing it was neither wise nor in good taste to torment a fish-fellow that was ever so much larger and stronger than himself.