AN: This is NOT a new chapter. Sorry... ^^'
But it is the real story of the Little Mermaid. Enjoy~
The Little Mermaid
Original Story by Hans Christian Anderson
Far out to sea the water is as blue as the petals of the loveliest cornflower and as clear as the purest glass; but it is deep, deper than any anchor can reach. Countless church steeples would have to be piled one on top of the other to stretch from the sea bed to the surface. That's where the sea folk live.
Now you mustn't imagine that the bottom is just bare white sand, not at all. Wonderful trees and plants grow down there, with stems and leaves so sensitive that they curl and sway with the slightest movement of the water, as if they were living creatures. Fish, large and small, flit through the branches just like birds up in the air here.
At the very deepest point lies the palace of the sea king. Its walls are of coral, and the long, pointed windows are of the clearest amber. The foor is made of cockle shells that open and hust with the play of the waves. It's lovely to see, because nestling in each shell is a shining pearl, any one of which would be the pride of a queen's crown.
The sea king had been a windower for many years, but his old mother kept house for him. She was a wise old lady, but rather too proud of being royal; that's why she always wore twelve oysters on her tail, when the rest of the nobility were only allowed six. Aside from that she was a praiseworthy sort, and she took very good care of her granddaughters, the little sea princesses.
There were six of them, all beautiful, but the youngest was the loveliest of them all. Her skin was pure and clear as a rose petal, and her eyes were as bule as the deepest lake. But like all the others, she had no legs – her body ended in a fish's tail.
All the livelong day they would play down there in the palace, in its spacious apartments where living flowers grew from the walls. When the great amber windows were open, the fish would dart in and out, just as the swallows do up here, and they would eat out of the princesses' hands and let themselves be petted.
Outside the castle was a great park with trees of deep blue and fiery red; the fruits shone like gold, and their flowers glowed like flames among the flickering leaves. The earth was of the finest sand, but blue as burning sulphur. Everything was suffused with blue, so that you might think you were high up in the air, with the sky above and below you, rather than down at the bottom of the sea. When the sea was calm, you could glimpse the sun up above, like a crimson flower from which light came streaming down.
Each little princess had her own patch of garden, where she could plant whatever she fancied. One made a flowerbed in the shape of a whale; another preferred hers to look like a mermaid. But the youngest princess made hers round like the sun and would only plant flowers that shone red like it. She was a strange child, quiet and thoughful. Her sisters' gardens were full of oddments salvaged from shipwrecks, but she had only the statue of a handsome boy in hers. It was carved from clear white marble, and it had sunk to the bottom of the sea when the ship that was carrying it was lost. Beside this statue she planted a rose-red weeping willow, which grew taller than it and shaded it with its overhanging branches. In the play of violet shaodws on the blue sand, it looked as if the statue and the tree were embracing.
The princesses liked nothing more than to listen to stories of the world above. The old grandmother had to tell again and again everything she knew about ships, and towns, and people, and animals. The youngest princess was particularly taken with the idea that up above flowers were scented, for at the bottom of the sea they had no smell at all. She also liked to hear about the green forest, and how the fish that swam among the branches could sing so beautifully. Her grandmother called birds "fish" – otherwise the princesses wouldn't have understood, for they had never seen a bird.
"When you turn fifteen," their grandmother would say, "you too will be able to swim to the surface and sit on rocks in the moonlight to watch the great ships sailing by. If you dare, you can swim close enough to the shore to see woods and towns."
The following year the oldest of the sisters would be fifteen. The others were each spaced about a year apart, so that the youngest would have to wait another five whole years before she was allowed to swim up from the sea bed and take a look at us. But each sister promised the others she would come back after her first day on the surface and tell all the exciting things she had seen. For their grandmother didn't tell them nearly enough – there was so much they wanted to know.
None of them was so full of yearning as the youngest – the one who had the longest time to wait, and who was so quiet and thoughtful. Many a night she stood at the open window and gazed up through the dark blue water. She could make out the moon and the stars, though they were pale and blurry beneath the sea. If a black cloud passd over, she knew it must be either a whale swimming overhead or else a ship sailing along the surface; the passengers and crew never dreaming that a lovely mermaid stood in the depths below them and stretched her white hands out to them.
Now the oldest sister was fifteen, and free to swim up to the surface. When she came back she had hundreds of things to tell. The loveliest thing of all, she said, was to lie in the moonlight on a sandbank when the sea was calm and look across to a seaport town, with its lights twinkling like stars, and music playing, and all the clatter of carts and people; she loved to watch and listen, and to see the church spires and hear the bells ringing. Though she knew she could never go there, yet her heart was filled with longing to.
The youngest princess hung on her every word. Late in the evening, as she stood dreaming at the open window and gazing up through the water, she thought so hard about the town that she imagined she could hear the church bells chime.
Next year the second sister got her freedom. She surfaced just as the sun was setting, and the sight was so ravishing that she could barely describe it. The whole sky had been a blaze of gold, she said, and as for the coulds – she couldn't find words to capture their beauty as they sailed over her head, streaked with crimson and violet. A skein of wild swans had flown into the setting sun, as if drawing a white veil across the water. She had swum after them, but as the sun sank, so the vision of sea, sky, and cloud had faded.
The third of the sisters was the most daring of them all. She swam right inland up a broad river. She saw green hills covered with vines, castles, and farms hidden in the forest. She heard the birds singing, and the sun was so hot that she was often forced to dive back under water to cool her burning face. In a small cove she ha come upon a group of human children splashing in the water, quite naked, but when she tried to play with them, they ran off in alarm. Then a little black animal – it was a dog, but she didn't know that – had come and barked at her so furiously that she took fright and headed out to sea. But she would never forget those magnificent woods and green hills, and those sweet little children who tried to swim in the water even though they had no tails.
The fourth sister was not so bold. She stayed well away from shore, and she said that there wasn't anything more beautiful than the open sea, with nothing for miles around and the sky above like a great glass bell. She had seen ships, but so far away they looked like seagulls. She had swum with the dolphins, who had turned somersaults for her, and the huge whales had sprayed jets of water into the air, like so many fountains.
The fifth sister's birthday fell in winter, so she saw something none of her sisters had seen. The sea looked quite green, and great icebergs were floating in it. They looked like pearls, yet each one was larger than a church tower. They had the strangest shpaes, and they sparkled like diamonds. She had seated herself on one of the largest, and all the sailors had steered away in fear as they sailed past the iceberg where she sat with her long hair streaming in the wind. By evening a storm was blowing. The dark waves lifted the icebergs high up, and lightning flashed red on the ice. The ships had furled their sails and waited out the storm in terror, while she sat calmly on her iceberg and watched the blue lightning zigzag into the glittering sea.
The first time any of the sisters was allowed to go the surface she was always delighted to see so many things that were new and beautiful. But when they were older and could go any time they liked, they soon lost interest; they wanted to be back home. The bottom of the ocean was the most beautiful place of all.
Still, many an evening the five sisters would link arms and rise to the surface together. They had lovely voices – more hauntingly beautiful than any human voice – and when a storm was blowing and they thought the ships might be wrecked, they would swim in front of them and sing about all the wonders waiting at the bottom of the sea. Their song told the sailors not to be afraid of coming down – but the sailors could not make out the words in the howling storm. Nor did they ever see any of the delights of which the princesses sang, for when the ship sank the crew were drowned, and they came only as dead men to the palace of the sea king.
When the sisters floated up to the surface like this, arm in arm, their little sister stayed behind all alone. As she watched them go she would have cried, but a mermaid has no tears, and so she suffers all the more.
"If only I were fifteen!" she sighed. "I know that I shall love the world up there, and the people who live in it."
And then at last she was fifteen.
"There now! We're getting you off our hands at last!" said her old grandmother. "Let me dress you up like your sisters." She set a garland of white lilies in her hair, each petal was half a pearl. Then she made eight big oysters pinch fast onto her tail, to show that she was a princess.
"Ow! That hurts," said the little mermaid.
"One must suffer to be beautiful," said her grandmother.
The little mermaid woud have gladly swapped her heavy garland of pearls for some of the red flowers from her garden, which suited her much better, but she didn't dare.
"Goodbye," she said, and she floated up through the water as lightly as a bubble.
The sun had just set when she lifted her head above the water. The clouds still gleamed rose and gold, and in the pale pink sky the evening star shone clear and bright. The air was soft and fresh, and the sea was perfectly calm. A large three-masted ship lay close by. Only one sail was set, because there wasn't a breath of wind. The sailors were sitting idly in the rigging; below on the deck there was music and singing, and as the evening grew dark, hundreds of laterns were lit, like so many flags.
The little mermaid swam to a porthole and the waves lifted her up so that she could see the smartly dressed people inside. The handsomest of all was a young prince with jet-black eyes. This was his sixteenth birthday, and that was the cause of the celebrations. The sailors were dancing up on the deck, and when the young prince appeared, a hundred rockets shot up into the sky and turned the night back into bright day.
The little mermaid was quite scared and ducked back beneath the water, but she soon surfaced again. It felt as if the stars were falling out of the sky. She had never seen such fireworks. Great suns were spinning around, fiery fish were darting about the blue air, and all this glitter was reflected back from the clear mirror of the sea. The deck of the ship was so brightly lit that you could see every rope. How handsome the young prince was! He was laughing and smiling and shaking hands with everyone, while music rang out into the night.
It grew late, but the little mermaid could not take her eyes from the ship, and the handsome prince. The laterns were put out, the rockets were finished; no more cannons were fired. Yet deep beneath the sea there was a murmuring and grumbling. Still the mermaid rocked up and down on the waves to look into the cabin.
The ship gathered speed; more sails were unfurled. The waves became choppy, and clouds began to mass; in the distance there were flashes of lightning. A storm was brewing.
The sails were taken in, and the ship was tossed about by the huge waves that rose like black mountains high above the masts. The ship was like a swan diving down into the troughs of the waves and riding high on their crests. The little mermaid watched it all with glee – she thought it was great fun. But it was no joke for the sailors. The ship creaked and cracked, and its stout timbers shivered as the raging sea pounded against them. Suddenly the main mast snapped like a stick, and then the ship keeled over on her side as water poured into the hold.
Now the little mermaid could see that they were in danger; she herself had to watch out for planks and bits of wreckage that were floating in the water. For a moment it was so dark she couldn't see a thing; then lightning flashed and she could make out all the figures on board. It was every man for himself. She looked desperately for the young prince, and caught sight of him just as the ship broke up and sank into the sea. For a split second she was filled with joy. Now he was coming to her! But then she remembered that men cannot live in the water, and that he could only come to her father's palace as a corpse.
No! He must not die! She flung herself forward, heedless of the drifting beams that might have crushed her, plunging into the turbulent waves again and again until she found the prince. He was barely able to keep afloat in that heaving sea; his arms and legs were tired out. He closed his beautiful eyes, and he must certainly have drowned if the little mermaid had not come to him. She held his head above the water and let the waves carry the two of them where they would.
By morning the storm was over. Not a trace of the ship remained. The sun rose up red and glorious from the waves, and it seemed to bring a touch of life to the pale face of the prince, though his eyes remained shut. The mermaid kissed his forehead and stroked his wet hair. She thought he looked like the marble statue in her garden. She kissed him again, and wished with all her heart that he might live.
Now she could see dry land ahead, and high blue mountains with snow-covered peaks. Down by the shore there were green woods and a little whitewashed church or monastery, the little mermaid din't know which. Orange and lemon trees grew in the gargen, and by the gate were tall palms. There was a little bay with deep water right up to the shore, and the mermaid swan into it with the handsome prince and laid him on the white sand in the sun, taking care that his head as out of the water.
Now bells rang out from the building, and some young girls came out to walk in the garden. So the little mermaid swam out to some foam-flecked rocks and hid behind them, so that she could wait for someone to come and help the poor prince.
Quite soon a young girl came by. She seemed startled to see the half- drowned figure, but only for a few seconds; then she went and fetched help. The mermaid saw the prince revive and smile at those around him. He did not smile at her; he did not even know that she had rescued him. She felt empty. After he had been taken into the white building, she dived down into the water and returned sorrowing to her father's palace.
She had always been quiet and thoughtful; now she was even more so. Her sisters asked her what she had seen on her first visit to the surface, but she wouldn't say.
On many evenings, and many mornings, she went back to the place where she had left the prince. She saw the fruits in the garden grow ripe and be harvested. She saw the snow melt from the mountaintops, but she never saw the prince, and so she always went home even sadder than before.
Her one comfort was to sit in her little garden with her arms wrapped around the beautiful marble statue that reminded her so much of the prince. She never tended to the flowers, and they grew wild and tangled, climbing and interweaving until they shut out all the light from the garden.
At last she could bear it no longer and told one of her sisters her story; so before long all the sisters knew about it – but nobody else, except for a few mermaids who only told their closest friends. And it was one of these friends who found out who the prince was. She too had seen the birthday party on the ship, and she knew where he came from and where his kingdom lay.
"Come on, little sister," said the other princesses, and with their arms twined around each other's shoulders they rose up through the sea to surface outside the prince's palace.
The palace was built of pale yellow stone, with great flights of marble steps, one of which stretched right down to the sea. Gilded domes capped the roof, and between the pillars around the building were lifelike marble statues. Through the clear glass of the high windows you could see right into the state apartments with their precious hangings and tapestries and wonderful paintings. In the middle of the bieggest room a great fountain played, splashing its ater right up to the glass dome in the roof. The sun shone down through the glass onto the fountain and the beautiful plants that grew in it.
Now that she knew where he lived, she went there many an evening and many a night. She swam closer than any of the other dared – right up the narrow canal into the shadow cast by the prince's marble balcony. There she would gaze at the young prince, who believed himself all alone in the moonlight.
Often in the evening she saw him sailing in his fine boat, with its banners flying and music playing. She peeped from behind the reeds on the shore, and if anyone caught sight of her long silver veil when it was caught by the breeze, they only thought it was a swan flirting its wings.
Many a time, later at night, when the fishermen were casting their nets by torchlight, she heard them speaking well of the young prince, and that made her glad, for she had saved his life when he lay drifting half-dead on the waves. She rememberd how his head had rested on her breast, and how fiercely she had kissed him. But he knew nothing about that, he never dreamed she existed.
She became fonder and fonder of human beings, and longed to join them. Their world seemed so much larger than hers. They could sail across the oceans in ships, and climb mountains high above the clouds. Their lands with their fields and forests seemed to stretch forever. There was so much she wanted to know; questions her sisters couldn't answer. So she quizzed her old grandmother for everything she knew about the upper world, as she called the countries above the sea.
"If human beings are not drowned, do they live forever?" she asked. "Or do they die, as we do in the sea?"
"Yes," said the old lady, "they must die. And their lives are far shorter than ours. We can live for three hundred years, but at the end we just turn to foam on the water – we do not even have a grave down here among our loved ones. We do not have immortal souls; there is no new life for us. We're like the green reeds – once they are cut, they will never be green again. But human beings have a soul which lives forever, even after their body has turned to dust. The soul rises through the air to the bright stars. Just as we rise up out of the sea and gaze on the upper world, so they rise up to unknown glorious regions that we shall never see."
"Why have we no immortal soul?" the little mermaid asked sadly. "I would give all my three hundred years if I could live as a human being for one single say, and share in that heavenly world."
"You must not think of such things," said her grandmother." We are happier and better off here than they are up there."
"So I shall die, and drift as foam upon the ocean," said the little mermaid, "and never hear the waves again, or see the lovely flowers and the red sun. Is there nothing I can do to gain an immortal soul?"
"No," said the old lady. "Only if a human lovd you more than his father and mother, and thought only of you, and let a priest take his right hand and put it in your, while he promised to be true to you for all eternity, then his soul would flow into, and you would share in human happiness. He would give you a soul, yet still keep his own. But that can never be. For what we think beautiful down here – your tail – is thought ugly up there. They prefer two clumsy props, called legs."
The little mermaid glanced down at her fishtail, and sighed.
"We must be content with what we have," said the old lady, "and make the best of our three hundred years. We should dance and be gay, for it's a long sleep after. Tonight, let's have a court ball!"
It was a magnificent affair, the like of which has never been seen on earth. The walls and ceilings of the greatballroom were made of glass – quite thick, but perfectly clear. Several hundred enormous shells, rose red and grass green, were ranged as lamps on either side, and their blue flames lit up the whole room. Light spilled through the glass walls into the sea outside, where countless fish could be seen swimming about, their scales glowing purple, silver, and gold.
Through the middle of the ballroom flowed a broad swift stream, on which the sea folk danced to their own sweet songs. No humans have such lovely voices, and the little mermaid sang most beautifully of all. The others clapped their hands for her, and for a moment she felt a thrill of joy, for knew that she had the most beautiful voice of anyone on land or sea. But her thought seen returned to the world above, for she could not forget the handsome prince and her grief that she did not, like him, have an immortal soul. So she crept out of her father's palace, and while everyone else danced and sang, she sat alone in her gloomy little garden.
From up above she heard the sound of a horn echoing through the water. There he is, she thought, sailing so far beyond my reach, though I love him more than my father and mother, though he is always in my thoughts, thought I would place my life's happiness in his hand.
To win his love, and gain an immortal soul, I would dare anything! While my sisters are dancing in the palace, I will go to the sea witch, though I have always feared her, and ask her to help me.
And so the little mermaid left her garden and swam to the place where the sea witch lived, on the far side of a raging whirlpool. She had never gone that way before. No flowers grew there, no sea grass, nothing but bare sand until she reached the fearsome whirl pool, which was twisting and turning like a millwheel, dragging everything it could clutch down into the deep. She had to brave those roaring waters to reach the sea witch's domain. Once through the whirlpool, the path lay over a swamp of hot, bubbling mud, which the sea witch called her peat bog. Beyond this lay the witch's house, deep in an eerie forest.
The trees and bushes in this forest were all what they call polyps – half beast and half plant. They looked like hundred-headed snakes growing from the ground. Their branches were long slimy arms with fingers like wiggling worms; they never stopped moving, from root to tip, and whatever they touched they wound round, never to let go.
The little mermaid paused at the edge of this wood. She was so frightened she thought her heart would stop beating. She almost turned back. But then she thought of the prince, and the human soul, and that gave her courage. She bound up her long flowing hair so that the polyps could not snatch at it. Then she folded her hands together and dived forward, darting as fast as the fastest fish, in and out of the gruesome branches, which reached out their waving arms after her. She noticed that every one of them was holding tight to something it had caught; white skulls of drowned men, ships' rudders and seamen's chests, skeletons of land animals and – most horrible of all – a little mermaid whom they had taken and throttled.
Now she came to a swampy clearing in the wood, where enormous eels were writhing about, exposing their gross, sallow underbellies. Here the witch had built her house from the bones of shipwrecked men, and here she sat, letting a toad feed out of her mouth, just as some people do with a pet canary. She called the vile, slimy eels her little chickabiddies, and pressed them close to her great spongy chest.
"I know what you're after," she cackled, "and you're a fool. But you shall have your wish, for it will only bring you misery, my pretty princess. You want to be rid of your fishtail, and have two stumps instead, like humans have, and then the prince will fall in love with you, and you will marry him, and win an immortal soul – isn't that so?" And the sea witch gave such an evil laugh that the toad and the eels fell away from her and lay there sprawling in the slime.
"You've come in the nick of time," said the witch. "Tomorrow I couldn't have helped you for another year. I shall prepare you a potion. Tomorrow morning go to the shore and drink it before the sun rises. Then your tail will split in two, and shrink into what humans call 'pretty legs'. But it will hurt. It will be like a sharp sword slicing through you. Everyong who sees you will say you are the loveliest girl they have ever seen. But though you will move with a dancer's grace, every step you take will be like treading on a sharp knife – a blade that cuts to the bone. Will you suffer all this? If so, I can help you."
"Yes," said the little mermaid, thought her voice trembled. She fixed her thoughts on the prince, and the prize of an immortal soul.
"Don't forget," said the witch, "when once you have taken a human shape, you can never again be a mermaid. You can never dive down to your father's palace, or to your sisters. Yet if you do not win the prince's love, so that he forgets his father and mother and only thinks of you, and lets the priest join your hands as man and wife, then you will get no immortal soul. On the morning after the prince marries another, your heart will break and you will be nothing but foam on the water."
"My mind is made up," said the little mermaid, as pale as death.
"Then there's the matter of my fee," said the witch. "I won't do it for nothing. Yours is the most beautiful voice of all the sea folk; I expect you think to use it to charm the prince. But that voice you must give to me. You must pay for my potion with the most precious thing you possess. For in return I must shed my own blood, to make the potion as sharp as a two-edged sword."
"But if you take my voice," said the little mermaid, "what will I have left?"
"Your beauty, your grace, and your speaking eyes," said the witch. "These are enough to win a human heart. Well? Have you lost your courage? Put out your little tongue, and I shall cut it off in payment, then you shall receive my precious potion."
"Let is be so," said the little mermaid.
The witch put a cauldron on the fire to prepare her potion. "Cleanliness is a good thing," she said, wiping out the cauldron with some eels that she had tied in a knot. Then she scratched her breast and let black blood drip into the cauldron. The steam that arose was full of terrifying shapes. Every moment the witch threw some dread ingredient into the brew. When it came to the boil, it made the sound of a crying crocodile. But when the potion was ready, it looked like the clearest water.
"There you are!" said the witch, and she cut off the little mermaid's tongue. Now she had no voice, and she could neither sing nor speak.
"If the polyps give you any trouble on the way back," said the witch, "just throw one single drop of this potion at them, and they will split apart." But there was no need for that. When the polyps saw her, they shrank back in terror from the bright vial shining in her hand like a star. So the little mermaid passed safely back across the wood, the swamp, and the roaring whirlpool.
She could see her father's palace. The lights were out in the great ballroom; everyone must be asleep. She didn't dare go and look, now that she had lost her voice and was going to leave them for ever. She felt her heart break in grief. She crept into the garden and took one flower from the flower beds of each of her sisters; then she blew them each a farewell kiss, and rose up through the deep blue sea.
The sun had not yet risen when she reached the prince's castle and made her way up to the marble steps. The moon shone bright and clear. The little mermaid drank the bitter, burning drink and it was as if a two-edged sword had been thrust through her delicate body. She fainted away with the pain.
When the sun's rays touched her she awoke. The pain was still as sharp, but there in front of her stood the young prince. He fastened his jet-black eyes on her, and she cast her eyes down – and then she saw that her fishtaiil was gone, and that instead she had the prettiest, slenderest legs that any girl could wish for. But she was quite naked, so she warpped herself in her long flowing hair.
The prince asked who she was and how she had come there, but she could only look at him with her sweet, sad eyes; she could not speak. He took her by the hand and led her into the palace. Just as the witch had warned her, every step was like treading on a knife-edge. But she welcomed the pain. With her hand in the prince's, she felt she was walking on air. Everyone who saw her was charmed by her grace of movement.
She was given a lovely dress of silk and muslin, and everyone agreed she was the most beautiful girl in the palace. But she was mute, and could neither sing nor speak.
Beautiful girls dressed in silk and gold came and performed for the pricne and his parents. One of them sang more prettily than the rest, and the prince clapped his hands and smiled at her. It made the little mermaid sad, for she knew that she had once sang far more beautifully. And she thought, Oh! If only he knew I had sacrificed my voice in order to be with him!
Next the girls did a delightful dance. When they had finished, the little mermaid lifted her arms and stood on the tips of her toes. Then she began to float across the dance floor, with a grace that had never been seen before. There was such beauty in her movements, and her eyes were so full of feeling, that everyone was enchanted – especially the prince. He called her his little foundling. So she danced on and on, though every time her foot touched the floor she felt she was treading on sharp knives. The prince declared she must never leave him, and she was given a place to sleep outside his door on a velvet cushion.
The prince had a boy's velvet suit made for her, so that she could ride out with him on horseback. They rode through the sweet-smelling woods, where green branches brushed their shoulders, and the little birds trilled from among the cool leaves. She climbed high hills by the prince's side, and though her delicate feet bled for all to see, she only laughed, and followed him until they could see the clouds sailing beneath them like a flock of birds setting off for distant lands.
At night in the palace, while the others slept, she would go down the marble steps and cool her poor burning feet in the cold water. Then she would think of her sisters, down in the deep sea.
One night they came, arm in arm, singing the saddest song. She waved to them, and they recognized her at once. They told her how unhappy she had made them all. After that, they visited every night. Once she saw her old grandmother, far out to sea, and once her father, the sea king, with his crown on his head. They stretched out their hands to her, but they did not venture near enough to speak.
Day by day the prince grew more fond of her. But he loved her only as a dear, good child – he never thought of making her his wife. And she had to become his wife, or she could never win an immortal soul. On the day he married another, she would dissolve into foam on the sea.
"Don't you love me best?" her eyes would plead, when he took her in his arms and kissed her lovely brow.
"You really are the dearest creature," the prince would say, "because you have the kindest heart. You are so devoted, and you remind me of a young girl I saw only once, and shall probably never see again. I was on a ship that was wrecked, and the waves carried me to land close to a convent, which was home to many young maidens. The youngest of them all found me on the beach and saved my life. I saw her but twice, no more, yet I know she is the only one I could ever love, and you are so like her that you almost take her place in my heart. She belongs to the temple, but good fortuen has sent you to me – we shall never be parted!"
Ah! He does not know that I was the one who saved his life, thought the little mermaid. He does not know that I was the one who carried him through the waves to the convent, or that waited in the foam to see if anyone would come, and saw for the pretty girl whom he loves better than me. She gave a deep sigh, for she did not know how to cry. The girl belongs to the convent, so she will never come out into the world. I am with him every day. I will care for him, and love him, and give up my life to him.
But now people said that the young prince was to be married. He was fitting out a fine ship to go and see the country of another king, but everyone said, "It's not the country, it's the princess he's going to inspect." The little mermaid just shook her head and smiled a secret smile, for she knew the prince's thoughs, and they didn't.
"I shall have to go," he todl her. "My parents insist. But they cannot make me marry this princess, however pretty she is. I cannot love her. She will not remind me of the beautiful girl in the temple, as you do. If ever I chose a bride, I should choose you first, my silent foundling with the speaking eyes!" and he kissed her rose-red mouth, played with her long hair, and laid his head so near her heart that she was filled with dreams of human happiness and an immortal soul.
"Have you no fear of the sea, my silent child?" he said, as they stood on the deck of the spledid ship that was to take him to the nearby kingdom. He told the little mermaid how the sea could turn in a moment from calm to storm, and of the rare fish in the deep, and the strange sights divers had seen down there. And she smiled at his tales, for she knew better than he what lay beneath the waves.
In the moonlit night, when everyone but the helmsman at the wheel was asleep, she sat on the ship's rail and stared down through the clear water. She thought she saw her father's palace. On the topmost tower her grandmother was perched, with a silver crown on her head, staring up through the swift current at the passing ship. Then her sisters came to the surface, wringing their white hands, and looking at her with despair. She waved to them and smiled; she wanted them to know that all was well with her. But just then the cabin boy came out, and her sisters dived down; all he saw was foam on the water.
Next morning the ship sailed into port. Church bells rang out, and soldiers stood to attention with glittering bayonets. Banners were flying; everyone was on holiday. The prince was invited to one ball or party after another; but nothing was seen of the princess. It was said that she was being educated at a convent, learning how to be royal.
At last she arrived. The little mermaid was waiting for her, eager to judge her beauty. She had to admit that it would be hard to find a lovelier human girl. Her skin was so clear and delicate, and behind long dark lashes she had a pair of baby blue eyes.
"It is you!" cried the prince. "You who saved me when I lay half dead on the shore." And he clasped the blushing princess in his arms.
"Now I am too happy," he told the little mermaid. "My dearest wish – all I ever dared hope for – has been granted. You, whose heart is so true, will share my happiness." And the little mermaid kissed his hand and thought her heart would break. His wedding morning would bring her death; she would be nothing but foam on the sea.
All the church bells rang, and heralds rode through the streets to announce the wedding.
On the altar, silver lamps burned rare oils. The priests swung censers with burning incense. The prince and princess gave each other their hands, and the bishop blessed them. The little mermaid, dressed in silk and gold, held up the train of the bride's dress. But her ears did not hear the music, and her eyes did not see the sacred ceremony. This night would bring her death, and she was thinking of all she had lost.
That evening, the bride and bridegroom went on board ship; cannons were fired, and banners flew. Right on the main deck, a sumptuous tent of scarlet and gold had been set up, with the softest cushions on which the happy pair would rest on that calm, cool night.
The sails swelled in the breeze, and the ship glided across the clear water.
As darkness fell, bright lamps were lit, and the sailors danced jigs and reels on the deck. The little mermaid remembered the first time she had come to the surface, and had spied on just such a scene. Now she, too, whirled in the dance, gliding and soaring as a swallow does when it is pursued. How everyone cheered and clapped! Never before had she danced with such abandon. Sharp knives sliced her tender feet, but she scarcely felt the pain beside the raw wound in her heart. This was the last time she would see him – the handsome prince for whom she had given up her beautiful voice, turned her back on her home and family, and day after day endured pain without end. He had never noticed any of it. This was the last time she would breath the same air as he, or look upon the deep sea or the starry sky. An everlasting night, without thoughts, without dreams, awaited her – for she had no soul, nor any hope of one.
The merrymaking lasted long into the night. The little mermaid danced and laughed, with the thought of death heavy in her heart. Then the prince kissed his lovely bride, she caressed his dark locks, and arm in arm they retired to their magnificent tent.
The ship was hushed and still; there was only the helmsman standing at the wheel. The little mermaid leaned her white arms on the rail and looked eastward for the first pink of dawn. The first ray of sun, she knew, would kill her.
Then she saw her sisters rising out of the water. Their faces were pale and grim, and their long lustrous hair no longer streamed in the wind – it had been cut off.
"We have given our hair to the sea witch, so that she would help us to save your life. She has given us this knife. See know sharp it is! Before the sun rises you must plunge it into the prince's heart. When his warm blood splashes over your feet they will join together into a fishtail, and you will be a mermaid once more. You can come down to us and live out your three hundred years before you melt into the salt sea foam. Hurry! Either he or you must die by sunrise. Our old grandmother is grieving; her white hair has fallen out through sorrow, just as ours fell before the scissors of the witch. Kill the prince, and come back to us! Hurry! Do you not see the red streak in the sky? In a few minutes the sun will rise, and then you must die." And with a strange, deep sigh they sank beneath the waves.
The little mermaid drew aside the purple curtain of the tent and saw the beautiful bride asleep, with her had on the prince's breast. She stooped and kissed his handsome brow, glanced into the sky where the red light of dawn was glowing ever stonger, and looked back to the prince. In his sleep he was calling his bride by name; she alone filled his thoughts. The knife trembled in the mermaid's hand.
She flung it far out to sea. There was a glimmer of red as it fell, as if red drops of blood were splashing up from the water. One last glimpse of the prince through eyes half glazed by death, and she threw herself into the sea; she felt her body dissolving into the foam.
And now the sun came rising from the sea. Its rays were so gentle and warm on the cold foam that the little mermaid did not feeel the hand of death. She saw the bright sun and, hovering above her, hundreds of bright transparent creatures – she could see though them to the white sails of the ship and the pink clouds in the sky. Their voices were pure melody – so pure no human ear could hear it, just as no human eye could see them. They had no wings – they were lighter than air. The little mermaid saw that she had become like them, and was floating free above the foam.
"Who are you?" she asked, and she had a voice again – a voice like theirs, so heavenly that no music could ever capture it.
"We are the daughters of the air!" they replied. "A mermaid has no immortal soul, and she can never gain one unless she wins the love of a mortal. Her only chance of eternal life depends upon another. We daughters of the air are not given an immortal soul either, but by good deeds we can make our own soul. We fly to the hot countries, where plague gathers in the sultry air, and blow cool breezes to dispel it. We carry the healing fragrance of flowers to the sick. If for three hundred years we do nothing but good, then we win an immortal soul, and a share in mankind's enternal happiness. You, poor little mermaid, have striven with all your heart. You have suffered, and endured, and have raised yourself into the world of the spirits of the air. Now, by three hundred years of good deeds, you can make yourself an immortal soul."
And the little mermaid raised her translucent arms to the sun, and for the first time she shed a tear.
She heard life and movement from the ship. The prince and princess were searching for her; they were gazing sadly into the foam, as if they guessed she had flung herself into the sea. Unseenk she kissed the bride's forehead, gave a smile to the prince, and then with the other daughters of the air she asceded to a rose-pink cloud that was sailing by.
"In three hundred years I shal rise like this into the kingdom of heave," she whispered.
"Maybe even sooner," said one of the others. "We enter unseen into human homes where there are children. Whenever we find a good child, who makes its parents happy and repays their love, it makes us smile with joy, and a year is taken from the three hundred. But if we see a mean and naughty child, then we must weep tears of sorrow, and every tear adds another day to our time of trial."
~*~
AN: It's longer than even my normal chapter length! WOO~
Well.. if you want the pictures that go with it, the book's called The Little Mermaid and other Fairy Tales
By Hans Christian Anderson
Illustrated by Isabelle Brent
ISBN # 0-670-87840-5
There ya go!
Oh... and I have what you call writer's block... hehe... O.o
Ta ta~ bs~ (thy name is bullshit)
But it is the real story of the Little Mermaid. Enjoy~
The Little Mermaid
Original Story by Hans Christian Anderson
Far out to sea the water is as blue as the petals of the loveliest cornflower and as clear as the purest glass; but it is deep, deper than any anchor can reach. Countless church steeples would have to be piled one on top of the other to stretch from the sea bed to the surface. That's where the sea folk live.
Now you mustn't imagine that the bottom is just bare white sand, not at all. Wonderful trees and plants grow down there, with stems and leaves so sensitive that they curl and sway with the slightest movement of the water, as if they were living creatures. Fish, large and small, flit through the branches just like birds up in the air here.
At the very deepest point lies the palace of the sea king. Its walls are of coral, and the long, pointed windows are of the clearest amber. The foor is made of cockle shells that open and hust with the play of the waves. It's lovely to see, because nestling in each shell is a shining pearl, any one of which would be the pride of a queen's crown.
The sea king had been a windower for many years, but his old mother kept house for him. She was a wise old lady, but rather too proud of being royal; that's why she always wore twelve oysters on her tail, when the rest of the nobility were only allowed six. Aside from that she was a praiseworthy sort, and she took very good care of her granddaughters, the little sea princesses.
There were six of them, all beautiful, but the youngest was the loveliest of them all. Her skin was pure and clear as a rose petal, and her eyes were as bule as the deepest lake. But like all the others, she had no legs – her body ended in a fish's tail.
All the livelong day they would play down there in the palace, in its spacious apartments where living flowers grew from the walls. When the great amber windows were open, the fish would dart in and out, just as the swallows do up here, and they would eat out of the princesses' hands and let themselves be petted.
Outside the castle was a great park with trees of deep blue and fiery red; the fruits shone like gold, and their flowers glowed like flames among the flickering leaves. The earth was of the finest sand, but blue as burning sulphur. Everything was suffused with blue, so that you might think you were high up in the air, with the sky above and below you, rather than down at the bottom of the sea. When the sea was calm, you could glimpse the sun up above, like a crimson flower from which light came streaming down.
Each little princess had her own patch of garden, where she could plant whatever she fancied. One made a flowerbed in the shape of a whale; another preferred hers to look like a mermaid. But the youngest princess made hers round like the sun and would only plant flowers that shone red like it. She was a strange child, quiet and thoughful. Her sisters' gardens were full of oddments salvaged from shipwrecks, but she had only the statue of a handsome boy in hers. It was carved from clear white marble, and it had sunk to the bottom of the sea when the ship that was carrying it was lost. Beside this statue she planted a rose-red weeping willow, which grew taller than it and shaded it with its overhanging branches. In the play of violet shaodws on the blue sand, it looked as if the statue and the tree were embracing.
The princesses liked nothing more than to listen to stories of the world above. The old grandmother had to tell again and again everything she knew about ships, and towns, and people, and animals. The youngest princess was particularly taken with the idea that up above flowers were scented, for at the bottom of the sea they had no smell at all. She also liked to hear about the green forest, and how the fish that swam among the branches could sing so beautifully. Her grandmother called birds "fish" – otherwise the princesses wouldn't have understood, for they had never seen a bird.
"When you turn fifteen," their grandmother would say, "you too will be able to swim to the surface and sit on rocks in the moonlight to watch the great ships sailing by. If you dare, you can swim close enough to the shore to see woods and towns."
The following year the oldest of the sisters would be fifteen. The others were each spaced about a year apart, so that the youngest would have to wait another five whole years before she was allowed to swim up from the sea bed and take a look at us. But each sister promised the others she would come back after her first day on the surface and tell all the exciting things she had seen. For their grandmother didn't tell them nearly enough – there was so much they wanted to know.
None of them was so full of yearning as the youngest – the one who had the longest time to wait, and who was so quiet and thoughtful. Many a night she stood at the open window and gazed up through the dark blue water. She could make out the moon and the stars, though they were pale and blurry beneath the sea. If a black cloud passd over, she knew it must be either a whale swimming overhead or else a ship sailing along the surface; the passengers and crew never dreaming that a lovely mermaid stood in the depths below them and stretched her white hands out to them.
Now the oldest sister was fifteen, and free to swim up to the surface. When she came back she had hundreds of things to tell. The loveliest thing of all, she said, was to lie in the moonlight on a sandbank when the sea was calm and look across to a seaport town, with its lights twinkling like stars, and music playing, and all the clatter of carts and people; she loved to watch and listen, and to see the church spires and hear the bells ringing. Though she knew she could never go there, yet her heart was filled with longing to.
The youngest princess hung on her every word. Late in the evening, as she stood dreaming at the open window and gazing up through the water, she thought so hard about the town that she imagined she could hear the church bells chime.
Next year the second sister got her freedom. She surfaced just as the sun was setting, and the sight was so ravishing that she could barely describe it. The whole sky had been a blaze of gold, she said, and as for the coulds – she couldn't find words to capture their beauty as they sailed over her head, streaked with crimson and violet. A skein of wild swans had flown into the setting sun, as if drawing a white veil across the water. She had swum after them, but as the sun sank, so the vision of sea, sky, and cloud had faded.
The third of the sisters was the most daring of them all. She swam right inland up a broad river. She saw green hills covered with vines, castles, and farms hidden in the forest. She heard the birds singing, and the sun was so hot that she was often forced to dive back under water to cool her burning face. In a small cove she ha come upon a group of human children splashing in the water, quite naked, but when she tried to play with them, they ran off in alarm. Then a little black animal – it was a dog, but she didn't know that – had come and barked at her so furiously that she took fright and headed out to sea. But she would never forget those magnificent woods and green hills, and those sweet little children who tried to swim in the water even though they had no tails.
The fourth sister was not so bold. She stayed well away from shore, and she said that there wasn't anything more beautiful than the open sea, with nothing for miles around and the sky above like a great glass bell. She had seen ships, but so far away they looked like seagulls. She had swum with the dolphins, who had turned somersaults for her, and the huge whales had sprayed jets of water into the air, like so many fountains.
The fifth sister's birthday fell in winter, so she saw something none of her sisters had seen. The sea looked quite green, and great icebergs were floating in it. They looked like pearls, yet each one was larger than a church tower. They had the strangest shpaes, and they sparkled like diamonds. She had seated herself on one of the largest, and all the sailors had steered away in fear as they sailed past the iceberg where she sat with her long hair streaming in the wind. By evening a storm was blowing. The dark waves lifted the icebergs high up, and lightning flashed red on the ice. The ships had furled their sails and waited out the storm in terror, while she sat calmly on her iceberg and watched the blue lightning zigzag into the glittering sea.
The first time any of the sisters was allowed to go the surface she was always delighted to see so many things that were new and beautiful. But when they were older and could go any time they liked, they soon lost interest; they wanted to be back home. The bottom of the ocean was the most beautiful place of all.
Still, many an evening the five sisters would link arms and rise to the surface together. They had lovely voices – more hauntingly beautiful than any human voice – and when a storm was blowing and they thought the ships might be wrecked, they would swim in front of them and sing about all the wonders waiting at the bottom of the sea. Their song told the sailors not to be afraid of coming down – but the sailors could not make out the words in the howling storm. Nor did they ever see any of the delights of which the princesses sang, for when the ship sank the crew were drowned, and they came only as dead men to the palace of the sea king.
When the sisters floated up to the surface like this, arm in arm, their little sister stayed behind all alone. As she watched them go she would have cried, but a mermaid has no tears, and so she suffers all the more.
"If only I were fifteen!" she sighed. "I know that I shall love the world up there, and the people who live in it."
And then at last she was fifteen.
"There now! We're getting you off our hands at last!" said her old grandmother. "Let me dress you up like your sisters." She set a garland of white lilies in her hair, each petal was half a pearl. Then she made eight big oysters pinch fast onto her tail, to show that she was a princess.
"Ow! That hurts," said the little mermaid.
"One must suffer to be beautiful," said her grandmother.
The little mermaid woud have gladly swapped her heavy garland of pearls for some of the red flowers from her garden, which suited her much better, but she didn't dare.
"Goodbye," she said, and she floated up through the water as lightly as a bubble.
The sun had just set when she lifted her head above the water. The clouds still gleamed rose and gold, and in the pale pink sky the evening star shone clear and bright. The air was soft and fresh, and the sea was perfectly calm. A large three-masted ship lay close by. Only one sail was set, because there wasn't a breath of wind. The sailors were sitting idly in the rigging; below on the deck there was music and singing, and as the evening grew dark, hundreds of laterns were lit, like so many flags.
The little mermaid swam to a porthole and the waves lifted her up so that she could see the smartly dressed people inside. The handsomest of all was a young prince with jet-black eyes. This was his sixteenth birthday, and that was the cause of the celebrations. The sailors were dancing up on the deck, and when the young prince appeared, a hundred rockets shot up into the sky and turned the night back into bright day.
The little mermaid was quite scared and ducked back beneath the water, but she soon surfaced again. It felt as if the stars were falling out of the sky. She had never seen such fireworks. Great suns were spinning around, fiery fish were darting about the blue air, and all this glitter was reflected back from the clear mirror of the sea. The deck of the ship was so brightly lit that you could see every rope. How handsome the young prince was! He was laughing and smiling and shaking hands with everyone, while music rang out into the night.
It grew late, but the little mermaid could not take her eyes from the ship, and the handsome prince. The laterns were put out, the rockets were finished; no more cannons were fired. Yet deep beneath the sea there was a murmuring and grumbling. Still the mermaid rocked up and down on the waves to look into the cabin.
The ship gathered speed; more sails were unfurled. The waves became choppy, and clouds began to mass; in the distance there were flashes of lightning. A storm was brewing.
The sails were taken in, and the ship was tossed about by the huge waves that rose like black mountains high above the masts. The ship was like a swan diving down into the troughs of the waves and riding high on their crests. The little mermaid watched it all with glee – she thought it was great fun. But it was no joke for the sailors. The ship creaked and cracked, and its stout timbers shivered as the raging sea pounded against them. Suddenly the main mast snapped like a stick, and then the ship keeled over on her side as water poured into the hold.
Now the little mermaid could see that they were in danger; she herself had to watch out for planks and bits of wreckage that were floating in the water. For a moment it was so dark she couldn't see a thing; then lightning flashed and she could make out all the figures on board. It was every man for himself. She looked desperately for the young prince, and caught sight of him just as the ship broke up and sank into the sea. For a split second she was filled with joy. Now he was coming to her! But then she remembered that men cannot live in the water, and that he could only come to her father's palace as a corpse.
No! He must not die! She flung herself forward, heedless of the drifting beams that might have crushed her, plunging into the turbulent waves again and again until she found the prince. He was barely able to keep afloat in that heaving sea; his arms and legs were tired out. He closed his beautiful eyes, and he must certainly have drowned if the little mermaid had not come to him. She held his head above the water and let the waves carry the two of them where they would.
By morning the storm was over. Not a trace of the ship remained. The sun rose up red and glorious from the waves, and it seemed to bring a touch of life to the pale face of the prince, though his eyes remained shut. The mermaid kissed his forehead and stroked his wet hair. She thought he looked like the marble statue in her garden. She kissed him again, and wished with all her heart that he might live.
Now she could see dry land ahead, and high blue mountains with snow-covered peaks. Down by the shore there were green woods and a little whitewashed church or monastery, the little mermaid din't know which. Orange and lemon trees grew in the gargen, and by the gate were tall palms. There was a little bay with deep water right up to the shore, and the mermaid swan into it with the handsome prince and laid him on the white sand in the sun, taking care that his head as out of the water.
Now bells rang out from the building, and some young girls came out to walk in the garden. So the little mermaid swam out to some foam-flecked rocks and hid behind them, so that she could wait for someone to come and help the poor prince.
Quite soon a young girl came by. She seemed startled to see the half- drowned figure, but only for a few seconds; then she went and fetched help. The mermaid saw the prince revive and smile at those around him. He did not smile at her; he did not even know that she had rescued him. She felt empty. After he had been taken into the white building, she dived down into the water and returned sorrowing to her father's palace.
She had always been quiet and thoughtful; now she was even more so. Her sisters asked her what she had seen on her first visit to the surface, but she wouldn't say.
On many evenings, and many mornings, she went back to the place where she had left the prince. She saw the fruits in the garden grow ripe and be harvested. She saw the snow melt from the mountaintops, but she never saw the prince, and so she always went home even sadder than before.
Her one comfort was to sit in her little garden with her arms wrapped around the beautiful marble statue that reminded her so much of the prince. She never tended to the flowers, and they grew wild and tangled, climbing and interweaving until they shut out all the light from the garden.
At last she could bear it no longer and told one of her sisters her story; so before long all the sisters knew about it – but nobody else, except for a few mermaids who only told their closest friends. And it was one of these friends who found out who the prince was. She too had seen the birthday party on the ship, and she knew where he came from and where his kingdom lay.
"Come on, little sister," said the other princesses, and with their arms twined around each other's shoulders they rose up through the sea to surface outside the prince's palace.
The palace was built of pale yellow stone, with great flights of marble steps, one of which stretched right down to the sea. Gilded domes capped the roof, and between the pillars around the building were lifelike marble statues. Through the clear glass of the high windows you could see right into the state apartments with their precious hangings and tapestries and wonderful paintings. In the middle of the bieggest room a great fountain played, splashing its ater right up to the glass dome in the roof. The sun shone down through the glass onto the fountain and the beautiful plants that grew in it.
Now that she knew where he lived, she went there many an evening and many a night. She swam closer than any of the other dared – right up the narrow canal into the shadow cast by the prince's marble balcony. There she would gaze at the young prince, who believed himself all alone in the moonlight.
Often in the evening she saw him sailing in his fine boat, with its banners flying and music playing. She peeped from behind the reeds on the shore, and if anyone caught sight of her long silver veil when it was caught by the breeze, they only thought it was a swan flirting its wings.
Many a time, later at night, when the fishermen were casting their nets by torchlight, she heard them speaking well of the young prince, and that made her glad, for she had saved his life when he lay drifting half-dead on the waves. She rememberd how his head had rested on her breast, and how fiercely she had kissed him. But he knew nothing about that, he never dreamed she existed.
She became fonder and fonder of human beings, and longed to join them. Their world seemed so much larger than hers. They could sail across the oceans in ships, and climb mountains high above the clouds. Their lands with their fields and forests seemed to stretch forever. There was so much she wanted to know; questions her sisters couldn't answer. So she quizzed her old grandmother for everything she knew about the upper world, as she called the countries above the sea.
"If human beings are not drowned, do they live forever?" she asked. "Or do they die, as we do in the sea?"
"Yes," said the old lady, "they must die. And their lives are far shorter than ours. We can live for three hundred years, but at the end we just turn to foam on the water – we do not even have a grave down here among our loved ones. We do not have immortal souls; there is no new life for us. We're like the green reeds – once they are cut, they will never be green again. But human beings have a soul which lives forever, even after their body has turned to dust. The soul rises through the air to the bright stars. Just as we rise up out of the sea and gaze on the upper world, so they rise up to unknown glorious regions that we shall never see."
"Why have we no immortal soul?" the little mermaid asked sadly. "I would give all my three hundred years if I could live as a human being for one single say, and share in that heavenly world."
"You must not think of such things," said her grandmother." We are happier and better off here than they are up there."
"So I shall die, and drift as foam upon the ocean," said the little mermaid, "and never hear the waves again, or see the lovely flowers and the red sun. Is there nothing I can do to gain an immortal soul?"
"No," said the old lady. "Only if a human lovd you more than his father and mother, and thought only of you, and let a priest take his right hand and put it in your, while he promised to be true to you for all eternity, then his soul would flow into, and you would share in human happiness. He would give you a soul, yet still keep his own. But that can never be. For what we think beautiful down here – your tail – is thought ugly up there. They prefer two clumsy props, called legs."
The little mermaid glanced down at her fishtail, and sighed.
"We must be content with what we have," said the old lady, "and make the best of our three hundred years. We should dance and be gay, for it's a long sleep after. Tonight, let's have a court ball!"
It was a magnificent affair, the like of which has never been seen on earth. The walls and ceilings of the greatballroom were made of glass – quite thick, but perfectly clear. Several hundred enormous shells, rose red and grass green, were ranged as lamps on either side, and their blue flames lit up the whole room. Light spilled through the glass walls into the sea outside, where countless fish could be seen swimming about, their scales glowing purple, silver, and gold.
Through the middle of the ballroom flowed a broad swift stream, on which the sea folk danced to their own sweet songs. No humans have such lovely voices, and the little mermaid sang most beautifully of all. The others clapped their hands for her, and for a moment she felt a thrill of joy, for knew that she had the most beautiful voice of anyone on land or sea. But her thought seen returned to the world above, for she could not forget the handsome prince and her grief that she did not, like him, have an immortal soul. So she crept out of her father's palace, and while everyone else danced and sang, she sat alone in her gloomy little garden.
From up above she heard the sound of a horn echoing through the water. There he is, she thought, sailing so far beyond my reach, though I love him more than my father and mother, though he is always in my thoughts, thought I would place my life's happiness in his hand.
To win his love, and gain an immortal soul, I would dare anything! While my sisters are dancing in the palace, I will go to the sea witch, though I have always feared her, and ask her to help me.
And so the little mermaid left her garden and swam to the place where the sea witch lived, on the far side of a raging whirlpool. She had never gone that way before. No flowers grew there, no sea grass, nothing but bare sand until she reached the fearsome whirl pool, which was twisting and turning like a millwheel, dragging everything it could clutch down into the deep. She had to brave those roaring waters to reach the sea witch's domain. Once through the whirlpool, the path lay over a swamp of hot, bubbling mud, which the sea witch called her peat bog. Beyond this lay the witch's house, deep in an eerie forest.
The trees and bushes in this forest were all what they call polyps – half beast and half plant. They looked like hundred-headed snakes growing from the ground. Their branches were long slimy arms with fingers like wiggling worms; they never stopped moving, from root to tip, and whatever they touched they wound round, never to let go.
The little mermaid paused at the edge of this wood. She was so frightened she thought her heart would stop beating. She almost turned back. But then she thought of the prince, and the human soul, and that gave her courage. She bound up her long flowing hair so that the polyps could not snatch at it. Then she folded her hands together and dived forward, darting as fast as the fastest fish, in and out of the gruesome branches, which reached out their waving arms after her. She noticed that every one of them was holding tight to something it had caught; white skulls of drowned men, ships' rudders and seamen's chests, skeletons of land animals and – most horrible of all – a little mermaid whom they had taken and throttled.
Now she came to a swampy clearing in the wood, where enormous eels were writhing about, exposing their gross, sallow underbellies. Here the witch had built her house from the bones of shipwrecked men, and here she sat, letting a toad feed out of her mouth, just as some people do with a pet canary. She called the vile, slimy eels her little chickabiddies, and pressed them close to her great spongy chest.
"I know what you're after," she cackled, "and you're a fool. But you shall have your wish, for it will only bring you misery, my pretty princess. You want to be rid of your fishtail, and have two stumps instead, like humans have, and then the prince will fall in love with you, and you will marry him, and win an immortal soul – isn't that so?" And the sea witch gave such an evil laugh that the toad and the eels fell away from her and lay there sprawling in the slime.
"You've come in the nick of time," said the witch. "Tomorrow I couldn't have helped you for another year. I shall prepare you a potion. Tomorrow morning go to the shore and drink it before the sun rises. Then your tail will split in two, and shrink into what humans call 'pretty legs'. But it will hurt. It will be like a sharp sword slicing through you. Everyong who sees you will say you are the loveliest girl they have ever seen. But though you will move with a dancer's grace, every step you take will be like treading on a sharp knife – a blade that cuts to the bone. Will you suffer all this? If so, I can help you."
"Yes," said the little mermaid, thought her voice trembled. She fixed her thoughts on the prince, and the prize of an immortal soul.
"Don't forget," said the witch, "when once you have taken a human shape, you can never again be a mermaid. You can never dive down to your father's palace, or to your sisters. Yet if you do not win the prince's love, so that he forgets his father and mother and only thinks of you, and lets the priest join your hands as man and wife, then you will get no immortal soul. On the morning after the prince marries another, your heart will break and you will be nothing but foam on the water."
"My mind is made up," said the little mermaid, as pale as death.
"Then there's the matter of my fee," said the witch. "I won't do it for nothing. Yours is the most beautiful voice of all the sea folk; I expect you think to use it to charm the prince. But that voice you must give to me. You must pay for my potion with the most precious thing you possess. For in return I must shed my own blood, to make the potion as sharp as a two-edged sword."
"But if you take my voice," said the little mermaid, "what will I have left?"
"Your beauty, your grace, and your speaking eyes," said the witch. "These are enough to win a human heart. Well? Have you lost your courage? Put out your little tongue, and I shall cut it off in payment, then you shall receive my precious potion."
"Let is be so," said the little mermaid.
The witch put a cauldron on the fire to prepare her potion. "Cleanliness is a good thing," she said, wiping out the cauldron with some eels that she had tied in a knot. Then she scratched her breast and let black blood drip into the cauldron. The steam that arose was full of terrifying shapes. Every moment the witch threw some dread ingredient into the brew. When it came to the boil, it made the sound of a crying crocodile. But when the potion was ready, it looked like the clearest water.
"There you are!" said the witch, and she cut off the little mermaid's tongue. Now she had no voice, and she could neither sing nor speak.
"If the polyps give you any trouble on the way back," said the witch, "just throw one single drop of this potion at them, and they will split apart." But there was no need for that. When the polyps saw her, they shrank back in terror from the bright vial shining in her hand like a star. So the little mermaid passed safely back across the wood, the swamp, and the roaring whirlpool.
She could see her father's palace. The lights were out in the great ballroom; everyone must be asleep. She didn't dare go and look, now that she had lost her voice and was going to leave them for ever. She felt her heart break in grief. She crept into the garden and took one flower from the flower beds of each of her sisters; then she blew them each a farewell kiss, and rose up through the deep blue sea.
The sun had not yet risen when she reached the prince's castle and made her way up to the marble steps. The moon shone bright and clear. The little mermaid drank the bitter, burning drink and it was as if a two-edged sword had been thrust through her delicate body. She fainted away with the pain.
When the sun's rays touched her she awoke. The pain was still as sharp, but there in front of her stood the young prince. He fastened his jet-black eyes on her, and she cast her eyes down – and then she saw that her fishtaiil was gone, and that instead she had the prettiest, slenderest legs that any girl could wish for. But she was quite naked, so she warpped herself in her long flowing hair.
The prince asked who she was and how she had come there, but she could only look at him with her sweet, sad eyes; she could not speak. He took her by the hand and led her into the palace. Just as the witch had warned her, every step was like treading on a knife-edge. But she welcomed the pain. With her hand in the prince's, she felt she was walking on air. Everyone who saw her was charmed by her grace of movement.
She was given a lovely dress of silk and muslin, and everyone agreed she was the most beautiful girl in the palace. But she was mute, and could neither sing nor speak.
Beautiful girls dressed in silk and gold came and performed for the pricne and his parents. One of them sang more prettily than the rest, and the prince clapped his hands and smiled at her. It made the little mermaid sad, for she knew that she had once sang far more beautifully. And she thought, Oh! If only he knew I had sacrificed my voice in order to be with him!
Next the girls did a delightful dance. When they had finished, the little mermaid lifted her arms and stood on the tips of her toes. Then she began to float across the dance floor, with a grace that had never been seen before. There was such beauty in her movements, and her eyes were so full of feeling, that everyone was enchanted – especially the prince. He called her his little foundling. So she danced on and on, though every time her foot touched the floor she felt she was treading on sharp knives. The prince declared she must never leave him, and she was given a place to sleep outside his door on a velvet cushion.
The prince had a boy's velvet suit made for her, so that she could ride out with him on horseback. They rode through the sweet-smelling woods, where green branches brushed their shoulders, and the little birds trilled from among the cool leaves. She climbed high hills by the prince's side, and though her delicate feet bled for all to see, she only laughed, and followed him until they could see the clouds sailing beneath them like a flock of birds setting off for distant lands.
At night in the palace, while the others slept, she would go down the marble steps and cool her poor burning feet in the cold water. Then she would think of her sisters, down in the deep sea.
One night they came, arm in arm, singing the saddest song. She waved to them, and they recognized her at once. They told her how unhappy she had made them all. After that, they visited every night. Once she saw her old grandmother, far out to sea, and once her father, the sea king, with his crown on his head. They stretched out their hands to her, but they did not venture near enough to speak.
Day by day the prince grew more fond of her. But he loved her only as a dear, good child – he never thought of making her his wife. And she had to become his wife, or she could never win an immortal soul. On the day he married another, she would dissolve into foam on the sea.
"Don't you love me best?" her eyes would plead, when he took her in his arms and kissed her lovely brow.
"You really are the dearest creature," the prince would say, "because you have the kindest heart. You are so devoted, and you remind me of a young girl I saw only once, and shall probably never see again. I was on a ship that was wrecked, and the waves carried me to land close to a convent, which was home to many young maidens. The youngest of them all found me on the beach and saved my life. I saw her but twice, no more, yet I know she is the only one I could ever love, and you are so like her that you almost take her place in my heart. She belongs to the temple, but good fortuen has sent you to me – we shall never be parted!"
Ah! He does not know that I was the one who saved his life, thought the little mermaid. He does not know that I was the one who carried him through the waves to the convent, or that waited in the foam to see if anyone would come, and saw for the pretty girl whom he loves better than me. She gave a deep sigh, for she did not know how to cry. The girl belongs to the convent, so she will never come out into the world. I am with him every day. I will care for him, and love him, and give up my life to him.
But now people said that the young prince was to be married. He was fitting out a fine ship to go and see the country of another king, but everyone said, "It's not the country, it's the princess he's going to inspect." The little mermaid just shook her head and smiled a secret smile, for she knew the prince's thoughs, and they didn't.
"I shall have to go," he todl her. "My parents insist. But they cannot make me marry this princess, however pretty she is. I cannot love her. She will not remind me of the beautiful girl in the temple, as you do. If ever I chose a bride, I should choose you first, my silent foundling with the speaking eyes!" and he kissed her rose-red mouth, played with her long hair, and laid his head so near her heart that she was filled with dreams of human happiness and an immortal soul.
"Have you no fear of the sea, my silent child?" he said, as they stood on the deck of the spledid ship that was to take him to the nearby kingdom. He told the little mermaid how the sea could turn in a moment from calm to storm, and of the rare fish in the deep, and the strange sights divers had seen down there. And she smiled at his tales, for she knew better than he what lay beneath the waves.
In the moonlit night, when everyone but the helmsman at the wheel was asleep, she sat on the ship's rail and stared down through the clear water. She thought she saw her father's palace. On the topmost tower her grandmother was perched, with a silver crown on her head, staring up through the swift current at the passing ship. Then her sisters came to the surface, wringing their white hands, and looking at her with despair. She waved to them and smiled; she wanted them to know that all was well with her. But just then the cabin boy came out, and her sisters dived down; all he saw was foam on the water.
Next morning the ship sailed into port. Church bells rang out, and soldiers stood to attention with glittering bayonets. Banners were flying; everyone was on holiday. The prince was invited to one ball or party after another; but nothing was seen of the princess. It was said that she was being educated at a convent, learning how to be royal.
At last she arrived. The little mermaid was waiting for her, eager to judge her beauty. She had to admit that it would be hard to find a lovelier human girl. Her skin was so clear and delicate, and behind long dark lashes she had a pair of baby blue eyes.
"It is you!" cried the prince. "You who saved me when I lay half dead on the shore." And he clasped the blushing princess in his arms.
"Now I am too happy," he told the little mermaid. "My dearest wish – all I ever dared hope for – has been granted. You, whose heart is so true, will share my happiness." And the little mermaid kissed his hand and thought her heart would break. His wedding morning would bring her death; she would be nothing but foam on the sea.
All the church bells rang, and heralds rode through the streets to announce the wedding.
On the altar, silver lamps burned rare oils. The priests swung censers with burning incense. The prince and princess gave each other their hands, and the bishop blessed them. The little mermaid, dressed in silk and gold, held up the train of the bride's dress. But her ears did not hear the music, and her eyes did not see the sacred ceremony. This night would bring her death, and she was thinking of all she had lost.
That evening, the bride and bridegroom went on board ship; cannons were fired, and banners flew. Right on the main deck, a sumptuous tent of scarlet and gold had been set up, with the softest cushions on which the happy pair would rest on that calm, cool night.
The sails swelled in the breeze, and the ship glided across the clear water.
As darkness fell, bright lamps were lit, and the sailors danced jigs and reels on the deck. The little mermaid remembered the first time she had come to the surface, and had spied on just such a scene. Now she, too, whirled in the dance, gliding and soaring as a swallow does when it is pursued. How everyone cheered and clapped! Never before had she danced with such abandon. Sharp knives sliced her tender feet, but she scarcely felt the pain beside the raw wound in her heart. This was the last time she would see him – the handsome prince for whom she had given up her beautiful voice, turned her back on her home and family, and day after day endured pain without end. He had never noticed any of it. This was the last time she would breath the same air as he, or look upon the deep sea or the starry sky. An everlasting night, without thoughts, without dreams, awaited her – for she had no soul, nor any hope of one.
The merrymaking lasted long into the night. The little mermaid danced and laughed, with the thought of death heavy in her heart. Then the prince kissed his lovely bride, she caressed his dark locks, and arm in arm they retired to their magnificent tent.
The ship was hushed and still; there was only the helmsman standing at the wheel. The little mermaid leaned her white arms on the rail and looked eastward for the first pink of dawn. The first ray of sun, she knew, would kill her.
Then she saw her sisters rising out of the water. Their faces were pale and grim, and their long lustrous hair no longer streamed in the wind – it had been cut off.
"We have given our hair to the sea witch, so that she would help us to save your life. She has given us this knife. See know sharp it is! Before the sun rises you must plunge it into the prince's heart. When his warm blood splashes over your feet they will join together into a fishtail, and you will be a mermaid once more. You can come down to us and live out your three hundred years before you melt into the salt sea foam. Hurry! Either he or you must die by sunrise. Our old grandmother is grieving; her white hair has fallen out through sorrow, just as ours fell before the scissors of the witch. Kill the prince, and come back to us! Hurry! Do you not see the red streak in the sky? In a few minutes the sun will rise, and then you must die." And with a strange, deep sigh they sank beneath the waves.
The little mermaid drew aside the purple curtain of the tent and saw the beautiful bride asleep, with her had on the prince's breast. She stooped and kissed his handsome brow, glanced into the sky where the red light of dawn was glowing ever stonger, and looked back to the prince. In his sleep he was calling his bride by name; she alone filled his thoughts. The knife trembled in the mermaid's hand.
She flung it far out to sea. There was a glimmer of red as it fell, as if red drops of blood were splashing up from the water. One last glimpse of the prince through eyes half glazed by death, and she threw herself into the sea; she felt her body dissolving into the foam.
And now the sun came rising from the sea. Its rays were so gentle and warm on the cold foam that the little mermaid did not feeel the hand of death. She saw the bright sun and, hovering above her, hundreds of bright transparent creatures – she could see though them to the white sails of the ship and the pink clouds in the sky. Their voices were pure melody – so pure no human ear could hear it, just as no human eye could see them. They had no wings – they were lighter than air. The little mermaid saw that she had become like them, and was floating free above the foam.
"Who are you?" she asked, and she had a voice again – a voice like theirs, so heavenly that no music could ever capture it.
"We are the daughters of the air!" they replied. "A mermaid has no immortal soul, and she can never gain one unless she wins the love of a mortal. Her only chance of eternal life depends upon another. We daughters of the air are not given an immortal soul either, but by good deeds we can make our own soul. We fly to the hot countries, where plague gathers in the sultry air, and blow cool breezes to dispel it. We carry the healing fragrance of flowers to the sick. If for three hundred years we do nothing but good, then we win an immortal soul, and a share in mankind's enternal happiness. You, poor little mermaid, have striven with all your heart. You have suffered, and endured, and have raised yourself into the world of the spirits of the air. Now, by three hundred years of good deeds, you can make yourself an immortal soul."
And the little mermaid raised her translucent arms to the sun, and for the first time she shed a tear.
She heard life and movement from the ship. The prince and princess were searching for her; they were gazing sadly into the foam, as if they guessed she had flung herself into the sea. Unseenk she kissed the bride's forehead, gave a smile to the prince, and then with the other daughters of the air she asceded to a rose-pink cloud that was sailing by.
"In three hundred years I shal rise like this into the kingdom of heave," she whispered.
"Maybe even sooner," said one of the others. "We enter unseen into human homes where there are children. Whenever we find a good child, who makes its parents happy and repays their love, it makes us smile with joy, and a year is taken from the three hundred. But if we see a mean and naughty child, then we must weep tears of sorrow, and every tear adds another day to our time of trial."
~*~
AN: It's longer than even my normal chapter length! WOO~
Well.. if you want the pictures that go with it, the book's called The Little Mermaid and other Fairy Tales
By Hans Christian Anderson
Illustrated by Isabelle Brent
ISBN # 0-670-87840-5
There ya go!
Oh... and I have what you call writer's block... hehe... O.o
Ta ta~ bs~ (thy name is bullshit)