27.海的女儿

Lesson Twenty-seven

The Little Mermaid

1.The next morning the ship sailed into the harbor of a beautiful town belonging to the king whom the prince was going to visit.

2.The church bells were ringing, and from the high towers sounded a flourish of trumpets; and soldiers, with flying colors and glittering bayonets, lined the rocks through which they passed.

3.Every day was a festival; balls and entertainments follow one another.But the princess had not yet appeared.

4.People said that she was being brought up and educated in a religious house, where she was learning every royal virtue.

5.At last she came.

6.Then the little mermaid, who was very anxious to see whether she was really beautiful,

7.was obliged to acknowledge that she had never seen a more perfect vision of beauty.

8.Her skin was delicately fair, and beneath her long dark eye-lashes her laughing blue eyes show with truth and purity.

9.“It was you,” said the prince, “who saved my life when I lay dead on the beach,”

10.and he folded his blushing bride in his arms.

11.“Oh, I am too happy,”

12.said he to the little mermaid; “my fondest hopes are all fulfilled.

13.You will rejoice at my happiness; for your devotion to me is great and sincere.”

14.The little mermaid kissed his hand,

15.and felt as if her heart were already broken.

16.She knew that his wedding morning would bring death to her, and she would change into the foam of the sea.

17.All the church bells rung and the heralds rode about the town proclaiming the betrothal.

18.Perfumed oil was burning in costly silver lamps on every altar.The priests waved the censers, while the bride and bridegroom joined their hands and received the blessing of the bishop.

19.The little mermaid, dressed in silk and gold, held up the bride’s train;

20.but her ears heard nothing of the festive music, and her eyes saw not the holy ceremony;

21.she thought of the night of death which was coming to her, and of all she had lost in the world.

22.On the same evening the bride and bridegroom went on board ship.

23.Cannons were roaring, flags waving,

24.and in the center of the ship a costly tent of purple and gold had been erected.

25.It contained elegant couches, for the reception of the bridal pair during the night.

26.The ship, with swelling sails and a favorable wind,

27.glided away smoothly and lightly over the calm sea.

28.When it grew dark, a number of colored lamps were lit, and the sailors danced merrily on the deck.

29.The little mermaid could not help thinking of her first rising out of the sea, when she had seen similar festivities and joys;

30.and she joined in the dance, poised herself in the air as a swallow when he pursues his prey,

31.and all present cheered her with wonder.She had never danced so elegantly before.

32.She knew this was the last evening she should ever see the prince,

33.for whom she had forsaken her kindred and her home; she had given up her beautiful voice, and suffered unheard-of pain daily for him, while he knew nothing of it.

34.This was the last evening that she would breathe the same air with him, or gaze on the starry sky and the deep sea;

35.an eternal night, without a thought of a dream, awaited her:

36.All was joy and gayety in board ship till long after midnight;

37.she laughed and danced with the rest, while the thoughts of death were in her heart.

38.The prince kissed his beautiful bride, while she played with his raven hair,

39.till they went arm-in-arm to rest in the splendid tent.

40.Then all became still on board the ship; the helmsman, along awake, stood at the helm.

41.The little mermaid leaned her while arm on the edge of the vessel, and looked towards the east for the first blush of morning,

42.for that first ray of dawn that would bring her death.

43.Sha saw her sisters rising out of the flood:

44.they were as pale as herself; but their long beautiful hair waved no more in the wind, and had been cut off.

45.“We have given out hair to the witch,” said they, “to obtain help for you, that you may not die tonight.

46.She has given us a knife:

47.here it is, see it is very sharp.Before the sun rises you must plunge it into the heart of the prince;

48.when the warm blood falls upon your feet they will grow together again, and form in a fish’s tail, and you will be once more a mermaid, and return to us to live out your three hundred years before you die and change into the salt sea foam.

49.Haste, then; he or you must die before sunrise.Our old grandmother moans so for you that her white hair is falling off from sorrow, as our fell under the witch’s scissors.

50.Kill the prince and come back;

51.Hasten, do you not see the first red streaks in the sky? In a few minutes the sun will rise, and you must die.”

52.And then they signed deeply and mournfully, and sank down beneath the waves.

53.The little mermaid drew back the crimson curtain of the tent, and beheld the fair bride with her head resting on the prince’s breast.

54.She bent down and kissed his fair brow, then looked at the sky on which the rosy dawn grew brighter and brighter;

55.then she glanced at the sharp knife, and again fixed her eyes on the prince, who whispered the name of his bride in his dreams.

56.She was in his thoughts, and the knife trembled in the hand of the little mermaid: then she flung it far away from her into the waves;

57.the water turned red where it fell, and the drops that spurted up looked like blood.

58.She cast one more lingering, half-fainting glance at the prince, and then threw herself from the ship into the sea,

59.and thought her body was dissolving into foam.