The next morning, when the Child came down on the beach, the sea lay
calm and bright, as if the world were opening her blue eyes, and gazing
full into the heavens and drinking in their smiles.
The Child found little to set right; all the creatures were so busy at
their various employments that none but the waves had time to play with
him; and even they crept lazily in, as if they were half asleep, and
hardly took the trouble to chase him when he ran from them. So the
sunshine and the quiet stole also into the merry heart of the Child, and
he seated himself beside the transparent rock-pool to watch and listen.
The first thing that attracted his attention was his friend the
Sea-anemone, expanding its flowery disk like a sun-flower in the crystal
water, with three companions rooted to the rock beside it. They all
seemed to feel the presence of the Child, and spread themselves like
flowers in the sunshine as he smiled on them. And clinging to a rock
beside them a tiny star expanded itself with long petals like a daisy,
silently stirring its delicate rays to and fro.
"Why are you never still?" said the Child.
"Because every movement is pleasure," it replied, "and every breath I
draw is a feast. My little fingers are always making little whirlpools
and drawing food into my lips."
"Are you always eating and drinking?" said the Child.
"Very often," said the sea-daisy, or anemone, not in the least abashed;
"it is so pleasant." And all the anemones echoed her words.
"Sometimes we rest," she added.
"You sleep," said the Child; "then do you dream?"
"I do not exactly know what you mean," said the snaky-locked anemone,
"but it is all very pleasant."
The Child was silent and watched them, and as he listened he caught the
sound of a low sweet song, which issued from their lips; but not only
from theirs--it was vibrating all around him, the whole air and the
crystal water seemed full of soft music. And the Child sat still and
listened.
As he listened and looked, wonder after wonder opened before him, as if
veil after veil were removed from his eyes. He was not often so long
still.
Just below where he sat a little solid sand-bridge spanned the pool. It
was full of small holes; and as he looked he perceived that each hole
was the entrance to a tube, and the whole bridge was built of these
tubes, carefully fitted into one another and glued together.
"Who built this?" he asked.
Instantly a hundred little heads came peeping out of the entrances of
the tubes. Each little head was encircled with a delicate ruffle, made
not of lace but of exquisite white feathers; and from each little head,
as it waved its two little feelers to and fro, came the answer--
"We built the bridge, and we live in it."
Then the Child saw that the pretty sand-bridge was also a city, and was
hollowed all through into chambers--each with its beautiful happy little
tenant; and he could have watched them all day, the delicate fringed
heads peeping out on the clear water-world, each from its own little
dwelling built by itself, whilst underneath the arch young shrimps and
tiny fishes flashed to and fro.
"Do you build anything besides bridges?" he asked at length.
"Look around you," answered the hundred little busy heads in chorus. And
as he looked he saw that the sides of the pool were in many places
covered with similar sand-chambers. Here ran out a pier far into the
crystal water, dividing it into tiny bays and creeks; there rose a toy
citadel, and near it a miniature cliff with peaks; and everywhere, from
tiny cliffs, and citadels, and piers, and moles, and bridges, peeped out
hundreds of the same delicate little ruffled heads, like courtiers of
the olden time.
The Child clapped his hands for pleasure, and longed to see the
soldier-crab and make him ashamed of himself.
"But what do you do when the tide is low, and your little cities are
left dry?" he asked.
"We each fill up the doorway of our chamber with a drop of water, and
retire into the darkness until the next tide," replied the little
courtiers.
"I like you so much," said the Child; "tell me more."
"We have many relations who dress much more magnificently than we do.
Some of them have ruffs of rose-colour and crimson, and we are quite
dwarfs beside them."
"Do they build cities like you?"
"They do not live in cities," was the reply. "They make their houses
more like the cockles and whelks, and live apart: some fix their shelly
houses flat on the rocks, some raise them high in the water so as to
look around them, some build on oyster-shells far down in the deep sea;
and these are the most beautiful of our race."
"I should like to see the deep sea," said the Child; "how beautiful it
must be there! How can you go there?"
"We do not know," replied the heads; "we are dwellers in cities, and we
are quite content where we are."
Then all the little heads vibrated joyously about, and the Child was
silent and heard the sweet music again floating around him in chorus
from the hundred little feathered heads.
As he sat still, a hairy little creature came sidling towards him over
the rocks. Its head and legs and back were covered with hair; it looked
like a miniature trunk of an old tree overgrown with moss, and the Child
could not help laughing to see it waddling towards him. It was not until
it came quite close that he saw it was a crab, and that what had seemed
hairs were sea-weeds and plant-animals growing on its shell.
"What can you carry all that on your back for?" asked the Child, as soon
as he could speak for laughing.
"I do not care in the least for it," said the crab good-naturedly. "I
suppose they all enjoy it; and it makes very little difference to me as
long as they do not come before my eyes."
And the hairy crab jerked itself merrily on, with the tiny forest on its
back. The merry laughter of the Child rang again among the rocks, and it
was some minutes before he began to look and listen again. Then he
gently drew back a quantity of brown sea-weeds, which were shading his
side of the pool, that he might see further into it.
Underneath the heavy brown leaves grew a tiny forest of crimson
corallines, fringing the pool all around, and throwing out their
delicate branches on all sides. These were motionless in the still
water--a fairy forest, motionless and beautiful, as if it had been
enchanted into stone. But beneath them and among them darted and flashed
countless tiny living creatures, enjoying every breath of their
lives;--little shell-fish opened and shut their shells to breathe and
eat; at the bottom, through the transparent water, many beautiful
anemones expanded their crowns of flowers; sea-snails thrust their horns
out of their pretty shells, and browsed on the green sea-herbage;
star-fish spread their pointed rays, beaded with orange, and clung with
their hundred little cushioned fingers to the rocks; whilst all around,
from the sides, peeped the tiny heads of the dwellers in the sand
cities. The little crystal pool was a world of happy living beings of
many races, each race having its own work and enjoyments; and from them
all floated around the Child the sweet soft song, like a sweet hymn. But
there were no words.
"What are you always singing?" asked the Child.
"We do not know the words," they answered. "We wait for you to sing them
to us, and then the song will be complete."
"Where can I learn them?" said the Child.
"We do not know," they answered; and the sweet music floated on, rising
and falling like a joyous, solemn hymn.
"I wonder if they know the words far out in the deep sea," thought the
Child.
And he went silently home to his cave.