"You're wigglin' all right now," observed Trot. "That's a fine tail
you've got, Cap'n, an' its green scales is jus' beautiful."

"Are they green, eh?" he asked, twisting around to try to see them.

"Green as em'ralds, Cap'n. How do they feel?"

"Feel, Trot, feel? Why, this tail beats that ol' wooden leg all
holler! I kin do stunts now that I couldn't o' done in a thousand
years with ol' peg."

"And don't be afraid of the rheumatism," advised the Princess. "No
mermaid ever catches cold or suffers pain in the water."

"Is Cap'n Bill a mermaid now?" asked Trot.

"Why, he's a merMAN, I suppose," laughed the pretty princess. "But
when he gets home, he will be just Cap'n Bill again."

"Wooden leg an' all?" inquired the child.

"To be sure, my dear."

The sailor was now trying his newly discovered power of swimming,
and became astonished at the feats he could accomplish. He could
dart this way and that with wonderful speed, and turn and dive, and
caper about in the water far better than he had ever been able to do
on land--even before he got the wooden leg. And a curious thing
about this present experience was that the water did not cling to
him and wet him as it had always done before. He still wore his