mermaids are strangers to me, especially the bald-headed one."

"I'm not a mermaid," asserted Cap'n Bill. "I'm a sailor jes'
a-visitin' the mermaids."

"Our friends are earth dwellers," explained the Queen.

"That's odd," said Muffruff. "I can't remember that any earth
dwellers ever came this way before. I never travel far, you see, for
I'm chief of this disorderly family of seals that live on this
island--on it and off it, that is."

"You're a poor chief," said a big turtle lying beside the seal. "If
your people are disorderly, it is your own fault."

Muffruff gave a chuckling laugh. Then, with a movement quick as
lightning, he pushed his head under the shell of the turtle and gave
it a sudden jerk. The huge turtle was tossed up on edge and then
turned flat upon its back, where its short legs struggled vainly to
right its overturned body.

"There!" snorted the Seal contemptuously. "Perhaps you'll dare
insult me again in the presence of visitors, you old mud-wallower!"

Seeing the plight of the turtle, several young seals came laughingly
wabbling to the spot, and as they approached the helpless creature
drew in his legs and head and closed his two shells tightly
together. The seals bumped against the turtle and gave it a push
that sent it sliding down the beach like a toboggan, and a minute
later it splashed into the water and sank out of sight. But that was