undoubtedly they had planned this; they looked down and smiled.

And now the men had every detail of them - the brown seaweeds and green
sea-grasses that swathed them, their bodies just short of heroic size,
deep-bosomed, broad-waisted, long-limbed; their arms round like a
woman's and strong like a man's; their hair that fell, a braid over each
ear, twined with brilliant flowers and green vines; their faces
super-humanly beautiful, though elvish; the gaminerie in their laughing
eyes, which sparkled through half-closed, thick-lashed lids, the
gaminerie in their smiling mouths, which showed twin rows of pearl
gleaming in tricksy mirth; their big, strong-looking, long-fingered
hands; their slimly smooth, exquisitely shaped, too-tiny, transparent
feet; their strong wrists; their stem-like, breakable ankles. Closer and
closer and closer they came. And now the men could almost touch them.
They paused an instant and fluttered - fluttered like a swarm of
butterflies undecided where to fly. As though choosing to rest, they
hovered-hovered with a gentle, slow, seductive undulation of wings, of
hands, of feet.

Then another impulse took them.

They broke handclasps and up they went, like arrows straight up - up -
up - up. Then they turned out to sea, streaming through the air in line
still, but one behind the other. And for the first time, sound came from
them; they threw off peals of girl-laughter that fell like handfuls of
diamonds. Their mirth ended in a long, eerie cry. Then straight out to
the eastern horizon they went and away and off.

They were dwindling rapidly.