"Toughyarn, Toughyarn," said a voice within me, "don't make an old fool of yourself. Mermaids are deceitful and dangerous, however beautiful, as you will find out to your cost before long. Think of your age, your position. Is it likely you can excite a genuine passion in any maid? For shame, sir. How can you appear romantic in her eyes, astride a grog cask. Only reflect a little."
But I would not reflect. I stifled the voice within me, and, abandoning myself to the impulse of my passion, pressed my hand to my heart, and was about to burst out afresh, when the fair one, fixing her large deep blue eyes upon me—deep as the Mediterranean in a calm—with a supernaturally winning smile, addressed me thus, in tones to which the softest music was discord:
"Welcome, Captain Toughyarn, to our haunts. Welcome to the Mermaid Grotto of pearl and coral, to my father's palace. It is long that we await you. We have heard much of your exploits by sea, and we are all impatient to make the acquaintance of a hero so illustrious."
"What!" I cried; "you have heard of me and expected me, O fair one?"
"Yes, captain, our Sybil has prophesied your arrival here, and your visit to our palace. Oh, she told me many things about you that she has seen in vision. The mutiny of your crew, your first mate struck with blindness when about to take your life. The loss of your second mate while reefing a sail. Your release by one of the crew, after having been bound to the mast; the wreck of your vessel; and, finally, our meeting, which tallies in the minutest particulars."
"What!" I exclaimed, in extreme astonishment, "all this she saw—even the grog barrel?"
"All—everything," replied my charmer; "but follow me, and lose no time; we all await you below."
So saying, she beckoned to me with the most bewitching smile, and floundered away from me, lashing her tail playfully as she went, and touching the chords of her harp, sang so sweetly, so divinely, some submarine ditty about fairy palaces, halls of coral, and fair mermaidens, that all resistance was vain.
"Don't be weak, Toughyarn," said the voice again; "resist her wiles, be deaf to her song."
But I was deaf only to the voice that warned me.