One calm bright morning, when the Child had been busy rendering services
to many of his sea friends, who had lost their way or had been roughly
treated by the waves, he came to rest himself by the rock-pool. There a
great surprise and delight awaited him. A large volute, nearly related
to some of his friends the whelks, had entangled his shell among some
long fronds of floating sea-weed: with him were swimming two creatures,
very beautiful, but strangers to the Child, and the whole formed a
little fairy raft, ready to take him out to the deep sea!
He understood it at once; his face flushed crimson with pleasure and
gratitude, and for a moment his voice was choked so that he could not
speak, for he thought, "Now I shall learn the words of the Song."
Then he clapped his hands and laughed aloud for joy, and thanked all the
creatures, and seated himself on the sea-weed, buoyed up by its
air-bladders, with one hand clasped round the volute, and the other laid
on the strange spiral shell.
Thousands of the sand-borers of the sabella family thrust out their
feathered heads to see him start, the hairy crab and many of his
brothers glared after him with their eager eyes, and even the
rock-borers--the hard-working pholases--crept out to the mouth of their
dens to watch him.
"I shall soon come back to you," said the Child; "and then we will sing
the Song together."
So the shell-fish plied their oars, and the other transparent creature
spread its sail, and they and the Child floated away together.
The Child wished to know something of his new companions before he lost
sight of all his old friends, so he politely asked them who they were.
One of them had a crystal body spotted with dark blue, from which many
little fingers shot down into the water and played about like oars,
whilst above rose a lovely little transparent sail, catching the breeze.
"Are you a medusa?" asked the Child.
"That is my family name," said the little boatman; "my own name is
Velella."
"And you?" said the Child, turning to the other stranger, whose head
came far out of his sculptured spiral shell, whilst a hundred delicate
feelers played around it in the waves, "I never saw any one like you
before."
"I am a nautilus," said the beautiful stranger. "Our family is one of
the oldest in the world. We are nearly the last of our race. The days of
our glory are well-nigh over, and we sail about here and there, a feeble
and dwarfish race, where our ancestors reigned supreme and unrivalled."
The Child wondered at these words, and could scarcely make out their
meaning; he had not dreamt about any world but the one he lived in, or
any days before those which rose and set on him; all around him seemed
so infinite and inexhaustible. And now the stranger, beautiful creature!
spoke to him from the entrance of a dim and wonderful world, of which he
knew nothing. So the Child sat silent, with endless wonder in his
earnest blue eyes, and looked for the first time on the vision of the
Past.
Then the Nautilus went on:--
"There was, they say, a time, before the mountains were uncovered, or
one of the trees you know had blossomed, when there was nothing more
beautiful or wiser than we in the world; and we dived into the sea
caves, and floated about in the boundless waste of waters beneath the
sun, and the moon, and the stars. Some of our race, who lived and
reigned then, have perished for ever, and their burial-places form the
foundation of your earth. If you wander inland among the hills, it is
said, you find everywhere the tombs of our ancestors carved in
imperishable stone."
"Are you unhappy," asked the Child, "since your family are so fallen?"
"I have lost nothing," said the nautilus. "We have all of us our cup of
life filled to the brim with happiness."
"Who fills it?" said the Child with a look of awe.
"We do not know," said the nautilus; "but it is always full."
The Child pressed his hand on his eyebrows,--it seemed too great and
difficult for him to understand; and then the thought crossed him that
the nautilus might have learned the words of the Song from his ancestors
who lived so very long ago, and he sat still and listened.
So they floated out of sight of land into the deep sea, and, mingled
with the quiet plash of the waves, came from around and beneath the old
sweet solemn Song. But it was always without words.
It was delightful to float about thus over the deep sea,--to be rocked
up and down on the great waves. There were no breakers, no foam--only
the constant heaving and rocking of the blue waves, with their emerald
lights and purple shadows. And the Child shut his eyes and listened,
with one hand round a horn of the volute shell, and the other laid on
the Nautilus, whilst the Velella unfurled her sail before them in the
sunshine; and he thought his dream had come true.
When he looked around again, numbers of strange and beautiful creatures
were floating around him, just below the surface of the water. Among
them was a large crystal umbrella fringed with delicate fringes, with a
quatre-foil of crimson in the centre, and numbers of small feelers
flashing to and fro in the clear sea underneath.
"Do you not know me?" it said. "I am the medusa you saved when wrecked
on your shore; and these are some of my relations gathered to welcome
you amongst us." And as she spoke, the little fleet formed in order
around him to do him honour; and they sang, "Stay with us, and be our
little King!"
Some spread their fairy transparent canopies, and shook all their
delicate fringes for joy; some flashed about little streamers--golden,
and rose, and opal-green--like flags on a festival; some spread sunny
sails, like the Velella; some tiny crystal globes darted in and out
among the rest, near the surface; and farther down in the clear water,
as far as the child's eyes could penetrate, the same living crystal
globes, and canopies, and balloons, flashed to and fro.
One little creature, however, delighted the Child beyond all the rest.
It was a tiny crystal globe, not larger than a hazel-nut, divided by
eight exquisite ribs. Each rib was formed of countless crystal plates
like the plates of a paddle-wheel, and each tiny plate was incessantly
vibrating up and down, carrying the restless little creature hither and
thither as it pleased, and making it flash with their ceaseless movement
like a balloon of sunbeams; while from underneath shot two delicate
threads fringed with many branching fibres, which were for ever curving
and waving about.
"What is your name?" asked the Child. "Why are you never still?"
"I am the Beroe," said the little balloon; "and those threads are my
fishing lines."
Thus the day wore away: the sweet hymn floated through the silence until
the Child was nearly wearied out with pleasure; and the Nautilus, and
the Velella, and the Volute turned their course homeward.
The gold, and emerald, and rose had faded from the sea before the little
party reached the shore; but then in the darkness began the greatest
sight of the day.
It was a festival on the sea; and everywhere, as far as the Child's
sight could reach, the waters were one illumination. Every one of the
little crystal fleet of medusae who had shone by day in the sunlight now
lighted its own tiny sun. All around the Child floated canopies, and
balloons, and globes, and boats of living fire, lamps of all forms and
colours flashing, gleaming, shining steadily with a soft radiance,
lighting the sea fathoms down; opal, and ruby, and emerald, and amber,
falling around the fairy raft in foam-flakes of fire as they glided
silently through the waves. And everywhere through the silence and the
night the happy living creatures sang as they shone that old sweet
solemn Song. So they reached the little creek by the rock-pool, and the
Child's old friends were many of them awake to welcome him home; but he
was wearied out with enjoyment, and tripped as fast as he could up to
his little bed in the cave. There he lay down and fell asleep with his
heart full of love and gratitude to all the creatures; but he had not
yet learned the words of the Song.