_THE BEWITCHED LOVER._
Off to Lisbon went the brig Sea-nymph, and after her the poor merman. He
stayed there as long as the ship stayed, hiding under boats and behind
timbers, chased more than once, in danger of his life every hour, hardly
able to get a glimpse of his idol. The wooden nymph stood straight up in
her place, looking toward the city this time, because her head happened
to be turned that way.
Once a priest going across the water in a boat happened to see him. The
priest took him for a demon, was dreadfully scared, and solemnly cursed
him, as is the fashion of priests when they are afraid of anything.
Besides, such is the approved mode of dealing with demons in those
countries. The report went abroad that there was an evil spirit in the
harbor. The Spanish and Italian sailors said innumerable prayers to the
saints and bought little blessed candles. The Yankees and Englishmen
hunted him whenever they could, for they had a curiosity to see what a
live demon was like. You may imagine what a life it was for the poor
merman. He was almost worn out when The Sea-nymph weighed anchor and set
sail for Sicily. He followed her, of course, for he was more possessed
than ever.
And yet away down at the bottom of his heart he had misgivings. When day
after day went on and the nymph stood still in the same place, he could
not help thinking to himself, “What if it should be a wooden image,
after all!”
But when this thought came into his head he drove it away, and called
himself all the names that ever were for daring to entertain such a
notion about his goddess. Was she not constant? Did she not always hold
out her vase toward him? He didn’t or wouldn’t think, the poor silly
merman, that it was because he always swam right before her and she
couldn’t hold it any other way.
Not far from the Straits of Gibraltar the merman met his most intimate
friend, who had been looking for him a long time, and had only heard of
him through Moby Dick.
“My dear fellow,” said his friend, “I am so glad to see you!” and then
he stopped, for he couldn’t help seeing that the other was not at all
glad to see him, and he felt hurt and disappointed.
“Are you?” said the merman, coldly, and gazing after the ship sailing
away from him.
“Why, of course. We’ve all been so anxious about you. Why haven’t you
written? Your grandfather has tried every spell he could think of, but
it all seemed of no use. The dear old gentleman is almost sick, and so
miserable about you that he has had no heart to finish his work, even
though the Baltic merman has come out with another pamphlet. Do come
home.”
Now as his friend spoke our merman felt at once how selfish and
ungrateful he had been. But his passion for his wooden nymph had so
altered his nature that instead of being sorry he was only angry with
himself, and pretended that he was angry with his friend.
“I suppose I am old enough to be my own master,” he said, haughtily.
“Why, what has come over you?” said his friend. “I’m sure it was natural
I should come to look for you. If I’d been lost, wouldn’t you have tried
to find me?”
The merman felt more and more ashamed of himself and grew crosser and
crosser. “Excuse me,” he said, coldly, “but I have business that I must
attend to. I don’t choose to discuss the subject;” and he swam away
after The Sea-nymph.
“But look here!” said his friend, coming after him. “I must tell you
something. I’m going to be married to your youngest sister, and I want
you to come and be best man. The girls are breaking their hearts about
you.”
“Oh, I dare say,” said the merman with a sneer. He had always been a
most affectionate brother, but now he had no room in his heart for
anything but his wooden image.
“And there’s a dear little girl next door that will be glad to see you.
She’s to be bridesmaid, of course. It’s my belief she likes you. The
sweetest mermaid in the sea, she is, except your sister.”
“She’s well enough for a mermaid,” said the merman, impatiently, for the
ship was going farther and farther away.
“I think you ought to be ashamed of yourself,” said his friend, growing
vexed at last. “I shall really think that absurd story of Moby Dick’s
was true when he said you were in love with a wooden statue of a human
being.”
“She’s not human,” snapped the merman, coloring scarlet; “she’s a nymph,
an immortal.”
“Let’s have a look at her,” he said.
“You are not worthy to behold her perfections,” said the merman.
“Why, a catfish may look at a congressman,” said his friend, quoting a
sea proverb. “Is she on board that ship off there? Come on;” and away he
went and our merman after him. They came up with the ship, and there, as
usual, stood the wooden image staring over the water.
“She’s watching for me,” said the merman.
The friend said nothing. He swam round and round, and looked up at the
figure-head through his eye-glass.
“Isn’t she a goddess?” asked our merman, impatiently.
“Goddess!” said the other. “My dear fellow, it’s only wood as sure as
you are alive.”
“No merman shall insult me,” said our merman, in a passion.
“Who wants to? Do open your eyes, my dear boy, and see for yourself.”
“I do; I see how she looks at me and holds out her silver vase.”
“She’ll do as much for me,” said his friend, swimming before the ship.
Our merman was wild with rage and jealousy, for he could not help seeing
that she did. He drew his sword (for he wore one), made of a sword-fish
blade, and flew at his friend. “Defend yourself,” he said.
“Nonsense,” said the other. “A likely story, I am going to fight you
about a wooden stick. As for looking at me, she’d do the same for any
old turtle.”
The merman couldn’t but feel that this was true. But he only grew more
angry. He struck his friend with all his might. There was a dark stain
on the sea.
“I’m not going to fight you,” said the other, turning very pale, “for
you are _her_ brother, but I think you’ll be very sorry for this some
time;” and he turned round and swam away as well as he could.
Fortunately, after a little he met Moby Dick.
“Hallo!” said the whale in a tone of concern. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing much,” said the other, for he wouldn’t tell the story.
The whale suspected the truth. He sniffed and wiped his eyes with his
flipper, for he was a soft-hearted monster.
“Come with me,” said he; “I’ll take you to a surgeon.”
He carried the wounded merman to an old sea-owl who lived in a cave
under the rock of Gibraltar. The old sea-owl was sitting in his door
reading the newspaper when Moby Dick came rushing toward him, supporting
in his flipper the hurt merman, who was too faint to swim.
“This young gentleman has met with an accident,” said the whale to the
sea-owl; “I want you to cure him.” The sea-owl laid down his paper and
took off his spectacles.
“What concern is it of yours?” said the sea-owl.
“That is none of your business,” said Moby Dick. “Take him into the
house and take care of him.”
“You are weakly sentimental,” said the sea-owl. “I perceive that you
belong to the rose-water class. What is suffering? A mere thrilling of a
certain set of nerves. It creates a sensation which we call pain. It is
disagreeable. Suppose it is. Are we sent into the world only to enjoy
ourselves? Enjoyment is contemptible; the desire of happiness is base,
unworthy a rational being. Let us rise to more exalted feelings; let us
glorify ourselves in discomfort; and if we see any one basely
comfortable, let us make ourselves as disagreeable as possible, and
raise him to our own platform. What possible difference does it make
whether we live or die, or are cold and hungry? What odds does it make
in this huge universe? Are we nothing but vultures screaming for prey?
Let us cultivate silence, that I may have the talk all to myself;” and
the sea-owl looked at Moby Dick in the most impressive and superior
manner. “What difference, I repeat, does our happiness or misery make in
the huge sum of the universal—?”
“Look here!” said Moby Dick, “if you don’t quit talking and tend to this
young man, I’ll swallow you. I don’t know as that will make much
difference in the universe, but it’ll make a sight of difference to
_you_;” and the whale opened his tremendous jaws wide and showed all his
teeth.
The sea-owl took the merman into his office on the instant. He bound up
his wound and attended him very carefully, for he was by no means such a
fool as you would imagine from his conversation. The merman was cured
before long, and made the sea-owl a handsome return for his services.
The owl was just as much pleased as though the money had been a large
item in the sum of the universe. He gave the merman a present of his own
poems neatly bound in shark skin. He had several hundred copies in his
office, for he had issued them at his own expense. They had been much
praised, but some way they did not sell. The sea-owl said it was because
all the people in the sea were “Philistines.” No one knew just what he
meant, but when he called people by that name most all of them
experienced a sort of crushed feeling, and pretended to admire the
poems. Sometimes they would even buy them, but not often. Moby Dick
accompanied the young merman home, and they made up a story that his
hurt had been caused by a sword-fish, against whom he had run in the
dark. Nobody believed him, for some way every one knew the truth, but
all the members of the family’s own circle pretended to believe the
tale, for they were all very high-bred people.
It had been intended that the wedding of the professor’s granddaughter
should be a very brilliant affair, but they felt so unhappy about the
grandson that they resolved to invite only a few intimate friends. Moby
Dick, of course, was among the number. He was too huge to come into the
house, but he put his nose to the window and ate ice cream with a fire
shovel for a spoon. The beautiful mermaid from next door was bridesmaid,
and looked most lovely. She seemed in better spirits than any one else,
and never said a word about her old playmate. Toward the end of the
evening she went out into the garden that was all glittering with sea
phosphorescence. She swam up to Moby Dick and said it was warm weather.
“So it is, my dear,” said the whale, and looking with admiration at the
bridesmaid, who wore white lace and emeralds.
“You came from Gibraltar, didn’t you?” said the mermaid, playing with
her looking-glass, which the sea ladies carry as ours do their fans.
“Yes, where the bridegroom and I went to see after that bewitched
brother-in-law of his,” said the whale, for he was vexed at the merman.
“Do you think he is bewitched?” said the bridesmaid.
The whale scratched his head, which is not vulgar in a whale.
“I never thought of it before,” he said; “but now you speak of it I
shouldn’t wonder if it was so.”
The bridesmaid whispered in the whale’s ear.
“I wish you’d come with me to the old Witch of the Sea,” she said.
“Won’t you, please?”
“I’ll go to the ends of the ocean with you, miss, if you want me to,”
said Moby Dick; “but what for?”
“Oh,” said the bridesmaid, looking straight in the eye which happened to
be that side of the whale’s head, “I’m a friend of the family, you know.
I’m very much attached to the girls and very fond of the professor. I
should like to help them if I could, and I think the witch is a wise
woman, and it wouldn’t do at all for the professor to go to her in his
position, but it won’t make any difference to me and you. Will you come
now? It isn’t far.”
“Of course I will,” said the whale. “Just sit on my head, and I’ll take
you there in no time.”
Just then the bride’s sister came out into the garden.
“Are you going, dear?” she said to the bridesmaid.
“Yes, I think I shall. Mr. Dick will see me home,” said the other
mermaid.
“It’s been rather forlorn,” sighed the bride’s sister. “To think of his
loving a wooden thing!”
“I suppose he had a right to if he chose,” said the mermaid a little
hastily. “I’m sure it’s nothing to me.”
The bride’s sister was not angry at all. She kissed her friend
good-night, and when she and Dick had gone sat down and cried a little.
“The poor dear!” she said.
Meanwhile Moby Dick and the bridesmaid were on their way to the old
Witch of the Sea. She lived in a cave in a thick dark grove of seaweed.
She was sitting before the door talking with a gossip of hers, one of
the Salem witches, whose broomstick would carry her through the water as
well as through the air. The broomstick, which was a spirited young one,
was standing hitched at the door, impatiently stamping its stick part on
the ground and switching the broom part about to keep off the little
crabs.
“Ho! ho!” said the Salem witch. “Here’s a dainty young maiden indeed!
I’m a great mind to stick a few pins in her.”
“You better hadn’t,” said Moby Dick, grimly, for he was not at all
afraid of witches. “Ask the old lady any questions you like, my dear;
nothing shall hurt you.”
[Illustration: “‘Ho! ho!’ said the Salem witch. ‘Here’s a dainty young
maiden indeed!’”]
“If you would be so good,” said the mermaid, taking off her jeweled
necklace and zone and holding them out to the witches, “will you tell me
where the professor’s grandson is, and whether he cannot be induced to
come home?”
“And what’s your interest in _him_?” said the Witch of the Sea, taking
snuff and looking at her sharply.
“I am his sister’s friend,” said the mermaid, steadily; “otherwise it is
not a matter of consequence to me whether he spends his life in the
chase of a wooden image; but I am very fond of the professor, and I
think it a very sad thing that he should be left alone in his old age.”
“Umph!” said the Salem witch. “Just the same, fish-tailed or two-legged,
in the sea or out of it. There’s a girl in our town as like her as two
peas.”
“Young lady,” said the Witch of the Sea, “I haven’t had any hand in this
matter.” (But of course I can’t say this was true. I incline myself to
think she had had her finger in the pie.) “I can’t undo the spell—not
now. If you want to find your friend’s brother, you must go West toward
the coast.”
“Take a bee line,” said the Salem witch.
“I don’t know what that is,” said the mermaid, who didn’t know what a
bee was.
“As the crow flies,” said the Salem witch.
“Crow?” said the mermaid, perplexed.
“As the mackerel swims,” said the sea witch.
“Oh, I see,” said the mermaid. “Thank you very much. Pray keep the
stones. Good-night;” and she turned to Moby Dick. “You’ll go with me?”
“To be sure,” said the whale. “That’s rather a dangerous coast for me,”
he thought to himself. “But never mind; if they come after me I can sink
a whaler as easy as nothing. I’ll go with her. She reminds me of a
whaless I used to go to school with;” and Moby Dick looked at the little
slim mermaid in her bridesmaid’s dress, and heaved a sigh about a
quarter of an acre in extent. “I’m your whale,” he said, cheerfully; and
away they dashed at the rate of a hundred miles an hour.
Every one in the sea knew that the professor’s grandson had fallen in
love with a wooden image, and was following it about the world. The very
porpoises talked about it to each other. The whole family were
dreadfully mortified.
“Suppose he marries her!” said his sisters.
“We never can take her into society. A real human being would be bad
enough, but a wooden one—”
“I disown him,” said the old mer professor. “I desire that no one will
mention him in my hearing. If he would only come home, the poor dear
boy!”
There was universal sympathy with the family. The very sophomores
behaved like gentlemen for as much as a week, they were so touched with
the old mer professor’s trouble.