Page:The water-babies.djvu/200

THE WATER BABIES they were. They were all named after the Nereids, the sea-fairies who took care of them, Eunice and Polynoe, Phyllodoce and Psamathe, and all the rest of the pretty darlings who swim round their Queen Amphitrite and her car of cameo shell. They were dressed in green velvet and black velvet and purple velvet; and were all jointed in rings, and some of them had three hundred brains apiece, so that they must have been uncommonly shrewd detectives; and some had eyes in their tails; and some had eyes in every joint, so that they kept a very sharp look-out; and when they wanted a baby-snake, they just grew one at the end of their own tails, and when it was able to take care of itself it dropped off; so that they brought up their families very cheaply.

But if any nasty things came by, out they rushed upon it; and then out of each of their hundreds of feet there sprang a whole cutler's shop of