Our first step was to prepare a chinquapin whistle. The flute was easily manufactured by Juan himself, thuswise: He cut a twig about eighteen inches in length, and not more than half an inch in diameter, and peeling the bark from the ends an inch or so, proceeded to rub the bark rapidly with a dry stick peeled perfectly smooth. In a short time the sap in the twig commenced to exude from both ends. Then placing the large end between his teeth he pulled suddenly, and the bark slipped off with a crack in it. Then cutting a small hole in the form of a parallelogram, near the upper end, he adjusted a stopper with flattened surface so as to fit exactly the opening. Cutting off the end of the stopple even with the bark and filling the lower opening nearly full of clay, he declared the work was done. As a proof of this, he blew into the hollow tube, and a low, musical sound was emitted, very flute-like and silvery. When blown harshly, it could be heard at a great distance, and filled the air with melodious echoes.
Thus equipped, we set out upon our search. The first two days were spent unsuccessfully. On the third we found ourselves near what is now called Agate Beach. At this place a small cove indents the land, which sweeps round in the form of a semi-circle. The shore is literally packed with agates and crystals. We dug some more than two feet deep in several places, but still could find no bottom to the glittering floor. They are of all colors, but the prevailing hues are red and yellow. Here Juan paused, and lifting his whistle to his lips, he performed a multitude of soft, gentle airs, which floated across the calm waves like a lover's serenade breathes o'er the breast of sleeping beauty. It all seemed in vain. We had now entirely circumnavigated the lake, and were on the eve of despairing utterly, when suddenly we beheld the surface of the lake, nearly a quarter of a mile from the shore, disturbed violently, as if some giant whale were floundering with a harpoon in its side. In a moment more the head and neck of one of those tremendous serpents that of late years have infested the lake, were uplifted some ten or fifteen feet above the surface. Almost at the same instant we beheld the head, face and hair, as of a human being, emerge quickly from the water, and look back toward the pursuing foe. The truth flashed upon us instantaneously. Here was a mermaid pursued by a serpent. On they came, seemingly regardless of our presence, and had approached to within twenty yards of the spot where we stood, when suddenly both came to a dead halt. Juan had never ceased for a moment to blow his tuneful flute, and it now became apparent that the notes had struck their hearing at the same time. To say that they were charmed would but half express their ecstatic condition. They were absolutely entranced.
The huge old serpent lolled along the waters for a hundred feet or so, and never so much as shook the spray from his hide. He looked like Milton's portrait of Satan, stretched out upon the burning marl of hell. In perfect contrast with the sea monster, the beautiful mermaiden lifted her pallid face above the water, dripping with the crystal tears of the lake, and gathering her long raven locks, that floated like the train of a meteor down her back, she carelessly flung them across her swelling bosom, as if to reproach us for gazing upon her beauteous form. But there my eyes were fastened! If she were entranced by the music, I was not less so with her beauty. Presently the roseate hues of a dying dolphin played athwart her brow and cheeks, and ere long a gentle sigh, as if stolen from the trembling chords of an Eolian harp, issued from her coral lips. Again and again it broke forth, until it beat in full symphony with the cadences of Juan's rustic flute.
My attention was at this moment aroused by the suspicious clicking of my comrade's rifle. Turning around suddenly, I beheld Liehard, with his piece leveled at the unconscious mermaid.
"Great God!" I exclaimed! "Liehard, would you commit murder?" But the warning came too late, for instantaneously the quick report of his rifle and the terrific shriek of the mermaid broke the noontide stillness; and, rearing her bleeding form almost entirely out of the water, she plunged headlong forwards, a corpse. Beholding his prey, powerless within his grasp, the serpent splashed toward her, and, ere I could cock my rifle, he had seized her unresisting body, and sank with it into the mysterious caverns of the lake. At this instant, I gave a loud outcry, as if in pain. On opening my eyes, my wife was bending over me, the midday sun was shining in my face, Dick Barter was spinning some confounded yarn about the Bay of Biscay and the rum trade of Jamaica, and the sloop Edith Beaty was still riding at anchor off the wild glen, and gazing tranquilly at her ugly image in the crystal mirror of Lake Bigler.
