According to Berosus there came up from the Red Sea, on the shore contiguous to Babylonia, a brute creature named Oannes, which had the body of a fish, above whose front parts rose the head of a man; it had two human feet, which projected from each side of the tail; it had also a human voice and human language. This strange monster sojourned among the rude people during the day, taking no food, but retiring to the sea again at night; and continued for some time, teaching them the arts of civilised life. Other ancient authors, as Polyhistor and Apollodorus, allude to the same tradition; and we gather that the portrait of the learned stranger (not painted from the life, we may presume, considering the condition of the people when he appeared, unless we may suppose it to have been the effort of one of his pupils in the pictorial art under his instruction) was preserved at Babylon to the historic period.

In an elaborate sculpture of the later Assyrian period, discovered by M. Botta at Khorsabad, a maritime expedition is portrayed, and the sea around the ships is filled with various marine animals, and among them the compound mythic forms of winged bulls and bull-lions, in which the Assyrians delighted, together with a figure composed of the body and tail of a fish extended horizontally, and the perpendicular trunk and foreparts of a man, crowned with the sacred cap, possibly representing the traditional Oannes.

The god Dagon of the Philistines, and the goddess Atergatis of the Syrians were worshipped under the same combination of the human and piscine forms, and the Tritons of classical mythology perpetuated the idea.

It is curious that in almost all ages and in almost all countries there should have prevailed a belief in the actual living existence of creatures like this. Was the mythological symbol the origin of the persuasion? Or is there any marine animal uniting so much of the general form of the fish with that of man as to have given the conception of the idol? A naturalist of deserved eminence has maintained, on purely scientific grounds, that such an animal must exist,—that the laws of nature absolutely require such a being; and though the amount of force which his reasoning, possesses will be estimated differently according as we reject or accept the hypothesis of the circularity of the great plan of nature, we may as well see what he has to say for a marine primate,—be he man or ape, mermaid or mermonkey.

"There is yet," says Mr Swainson, "another primary type necessary to complete the circle of the quadrumanous animals, and it is that which we have elsewhere distinguished as the natatorial; but of such an animal we have only vague and indefinite accounts. It will be seen that, throughout the whole class of quadrupeds, the aquatic types are remarkably few, and in general scarce; and that they contain fewer forms or examples than any other, and are often, in the smaller groups, entirely wanting. To account for this is altogether impossible; we can only call attention to the fact, as exemplified in the aquatic order of Cetacea, in that of the FerÆ, in the Pachydermata, in the circle of the Glires, and in all the remaining natatorial types of the different circles of quadrupeds. We do not implicitly believe in the existence of mermaids as described and depicted by the old writers—with a comb in the one hand and a mirror in the other; but it is difficult to imagine that the numerous records of singular marine animals, unlike any of those well known, have their origin in fraud or gross ignorance. Many of these narratives are given by eye-witnesses of the facts they vouch for—men of honesty and probity, having no object to gain by deception, and whose accounts have been confirmed by other witnesses equally trustworthy. Can it be supposed that the unfathomable depths of ocean are without their peculiar inhabitants, whose habits and economy rarely, if ever, bring them to the surface of the watery element? As reasonably might a Swiss mountaineer disbelieve in the existence of an ostrich, because it cannot inhabit his Alpine precipices, as that we should doubt that the rocks and caverns of the ocean are without animals destined to live in such situations, and such only. The natatorial type of the Quadrumana, however, is most assuredly wanting. Whatever its precise construction may or might have been, it would represent and correspond to the seals in the circle of the FerÆ, or rapacious quadrupeds; while a resemblance to the SimiadÆ, or monkeys, must be considered an essential character of any marine animal which is to connect and complete the circular series of types in the Quadrumana."

Mr Swainson absolutely excludes Man from the zoological circle, on grounds which few naturalists are disposed to think sufficient; else we might suggest that man himself is the natatorial type of the Primates. Taking this author's own selection[87] of the characters which mark the natatorial types of animals, for our guide, we find that the largest size, the smallest fore-limbs, the most obtuse muzzle, the most carnivorous appetite, and the most natatory habits (for I do not know that the Apes, or the Sapajous, or the Lemurs, or the Bats, ever take to the water voluntarily, whereas savage Man is always a great swimmer), belong to Man, and so, Swainsonio ipso judice, constitute him the true aquatic primate. But if so, we do not want a merman or mermonkey; nay, we should not know where to insert him in the zoological circle if we found him; he would be awkwardly de trop.

But yet nature has an awkward way of mocking at our impossibilities; and it may be that green-haired maidens with oary tails lurk in the ocean caves, and keep mirrors and combs upon their rocky shelves. Certainly the belief in them is very widely spread, and occasionally comes to us from quarters where we should hardly have looked for it. A negro from Dongola assured Prince Puckler Muskau that in the country of Sennaar there was no doubt that Sirens (mermaids) still existed, for that he himself had seen more than one.[88]

In my boyhood I well recollect being highly excited by the arrival in our town, at fair-time, of a "show," which professed to exhibit a mermaid, whose portrait, on canvas hung outside, was radiant in feminine loveliness and piscine scaliness. I fondly expected to see the very counterpart within, how disposed I did not venture to imagine, but alive and fascinating, of course. Had I not seen her picture? I joyfully paid my coppers, but oh! woful disappointment! I dimly saw, within a dusty glass case, in a dark corner, a shrivelled and blackened little thing which might have been moulded in mud for aught I could see, but which was labelled, "MERMAID!" So great was my disgust, so bitter my feelings of shame and anger at having been so grossly taken in, that I did not care to observe what might have been noteworthy in it. I read afterwards that it was a very ingenious cheat; the trunk and head of a monkey had been grafted on to the body and tail of a large salmon-like fish, and the junction had been so cleverly effected, that only a very close examination detected the artifice. It professed to have been brought from China, but possibly was an importation even thither, if Steinmetz is correct. According to this writer, "A Japanese fisherman contrived to unite the upper half of a monkey to the lower half of a fish, so neatly as to defy ordinary inspection. He then gave out that he had caught the creature alive in his net, but that it had died shortly after being taken out of the water; and he derived considerable pecuniary profit from his cunning in more ways than one. The exhibition of the sea-monster to Japanese curiosity paid well; but yet more productive was the assertion that the half-human fish, having spoken the few minutes it existed out of its native element, had predicted a certain number of years of wonderful fertility, and a fatal epidemic, the only remedy for which would be possession of the marine prophet's likeness. The sale of these pictured mermaids was immense. Either this composite animal, or another, the offspring of the success of the first, was sold at the Dutch factory, and transmitted to Batavia, where it fell into the hands of a speculating American, who brought it to Europe, and here, in the years 1822-3, exhibited his purchase as a real mermaid at every capital, to the admiration of the ignorant, the perplexity of the learned, and the filling of his own purse. Indeed, the mermaids exhibited in Europe and America, to the great profit of the enterprising showmen, have all been of Japanese manufacture."[89]

This, however, will not account for the frequent reports of the living creatures having been seen, and unbelievers have to form some other hypothesis. In the tropical seas the cow-whales, uncouth marine pachydermata, have been assumed to be the originals of these stories. Megasthenes reported that the sea which washed Taprobane, the modern Ceylon, was inhabited by a creature having the appearance of a woman; and Ælian improves the account by stating that there are whales having the form of satyrs. 'Tis true the Manatee and the Dugong are rather mer-swine than mer-maids; but there is something in the bluff round head which may remind a startled observer of the human form divine. Sir Emerson Tennent considers that this rude approach to the human outline, and the attitude of the mother while suckling her young, pressing it to her breast with one paw, while swimming with the other, the head of both being held perpendicularly above water, and then, when disturbed, suddenly diving and displaying her broad fin-like tail,—these, together with her habitual demonstrations of strong maternal affection, may probably have been the original from which the pictures of the mermaid were portrayed, and thus that earliest invention of mythical physiology may be traced to the Arab seamen and to the Greeks, who had watched the movements of the Dugong in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.

The early Portuguese settlers in India had no doubt that true mermen were found in those seas; and the annalist of the exploits of the Jesuits narrates that seven of these monsters, male and female, were captured at Manaar in 1560, and carried to Goa, where they were dissected by Demas Bosquez, physician to the Viceroy, and "their internal structure found to be in all respects conformable to the human." Making allowance for the very limited acquaintance which the worthy physician was likely to have made with human anatomy by actual autopsy, this statement goes for little:—the real resemblance, assuming them to have been Dugongs, was about the same as that presented by the hog, whose inwards are popularly believed by our own country people to be in very close accordance with those of "Christians."

Sir E. Tennent has embellished his book with a very taking portrait of the mermaid on the Dugong hypothesis; shewing two females, each holding a baby [is it right to say merbaby?], emerging from the sea-wave; they do look, to be sure, sufficiently human, but the well-known monogram of our clever friend Wolf in the corner of the cut suggests shrewd doubts that the portraits were not "ad viv."

It is, perhaps, among the Scandinavian races that the belief in the merman has reached its culminating point. So many particulars are inculcated concerning the mode and conditions of life of these submarine beings, that the most intimate relations appear to have subsisted between the terrestrial and the aquatic peoples. According to the creed of the Norsemen, there exists, far beneath the depths of the ocean, an atmosphere adapted to the breathing organs of beings resembling in form the human race, endowed with surpassing beauty, with limited supernatural powers, but liable to suffering, and even to death. Their dwelling is in a vast region, situate far below the bottom of the sea, which forms a canopy over them, like the sky over us, and there they inhabit houses constructed of the pearly and coralline productions of the ocean. Having lungs not adapted to a watery medium, but formed for breathing atmospheric air, it would be impossible for them to pass through the volume of waters that separates our world from theirs, if it were not that they possess the power of entering the skin of some marine animal, whose faculties they thus temporarily acquire, or of changing their own form and structure so as to suit the altered condition through which they are to travel. The most ordinary shape they assume is, as everybody knows, that of man (that is, their own proper form) from the waist upward, but below that of a fish. Whether they now breathe by gills or lungs, the anatomists, it seems, have not yet determined; we must presume the former alternative, since else it is not apparent what they have gained by their piscine metamorphosis of tail; though where the branchiÆ are situate we are a little at a loss to imagine. These, however, are matters which doubtless the scientific world will one day determine: it seems certain that they do thus acquire an amphibious nature, so as not only to exist submerged in the waters, but to land on the shores of our sunny world, where they frequently doff their fishy half, resume their proper human form, and pass muster while they pursue their investigations here.[90]

Unfortunately, but one of these resources can ever be availed of by any individual mer-man or -maid, nor can any "son or daughter of the ocean borrow more than one sea-dress of this kind for his own particular use; therefore if the garb should be mislaid on the shores he never can return to his submarine country and friends. A Shetlander, having once found an empty seal-skin on the shore, took it home and kept it in his possession. Soon after, he met the most lovely being who ever stepped on the earth, wringing her hands with distress, and loudly lamenting, that, having lost her sea-dress, she must remain for ever on the earth. The Shetlander, having fallen in love at first sight, said not a syllable about finding this precious treasure, but made his proposals, and offered to take her for better or for worse, as his future wife! The merlady, though not, as we know, much a woman of the world, very prudently accepted the offer! I never heard what the settlements were, but they lived very happily for some years, till one day, when the green-haired bride unexpectedly discovered her long-lost seal-skin, and instantly putting it on, she took a hasty farewell of everybody, and ran towards the shore. Her husband flew out in pursuit of her, but in vain! She sprang from point to point, and from rock to rock, till at length, hastening into the ocean, she disappeared for ever, leaving the worthy man, her husband, perfectly planet-struck and inconsolable on the shore!"[91]

Nor are there lacking in the rocky cliffs of our own northern islands fit lodgings for these sea kings and queens. The gifted pen of Sir Walter Scott has sketched one of these from his own observation: "Imagination can hardly conceive anything more beautiful than the extraordinary grotto discovered not many years since upon the estate of Alexander MacAllister, Esq. of Strathaird [in Skye]. The first entrance to this celebrated cave is rude and unpromising: but the light of the torches with which we were provided, was soon reflected from the roof, floor, and walls, which seemed as if they were sheeted with marble, partly smooth, partly rough with frostwork and rustic ornaments, and partly seeming to be wrought into statuary. The floor forms a steep and difficult ascent, and might be fancifully compared to a sheet of water, which, while it rushed whitening and foaming down a declivity, had been suddenly arrested and consolidated by the spell of an enchanter. Upon attaining the summit of this ascent, the cave opens into a splendid gallery, adorned with the most dazzling crystallizations, and finally descends with rapidity to the brink of a pool, of the most limpid water, about four or five yards broad. There opens beyond this pool a portal arch, formed by two columns of white spar, with beautiful chasing upon the sides, which promises a continuation of the cave. One of our sailors swam across, for there is no other mode of passing, and informed us (as indeed we partly saw by the light he carried) that the enchantment of MacAllister's cave terminates with this portal, a little beyond which there was only a rude cavern, speedily choked with stones and earth. But the pool on the brink of which we stood, surrounded by the most fanciful mouldings, in a substance resembling white marble, and distinguished by the depth and purity of its waters, might have been the bathing grotto of a naiad. The groups of combined figures projecting or embossed, by which the pool is surrounded, are exquisitely elegant and fanciful. A statuary might catch beautiful hints from the singular and romantic disposition of those stalactites. There is scarce a form or group on which active fancy may not trace figures or grotesque ornaments, which have been gradually moulded in this cavern by the dropping of the calcareous water hardening into petrifactions. Many of these fine groups have been injured by the senseless rage for appropriation of recent tourists; and the grotto has lost, (I am informed,) through the smoke of torches, something of that vivid silver tint which was originally one of its chief distinctions. But enough of beauty remains to compensate for all that may be lost."[92]

But these tales are the nugÆ canorÆ of the naturalist. Once more,—Is there any substratum of truth underlying these fancies? or must they be unhesitatingly dismissed to the region of fable? Certainly, if there were not two or three narratives which have an air of veracity and dependableness, bearing out the belief to some slight extent, I should not have noticed it here.

How simple and circumstantial is this story told by old Hudson, the renowned navigator! a man whose narrative is more than usually dry and destitute of everything like, not only imagination, but even an imaginative aspect of ordinary circumstances. On the 15th of June, when in lat. 75°, trying to force a passage to the pole near Nova Zembla, he records the following incident: "This morning one of our company looking overboard saw a mermaid; and calling up some of the company to see her, one more came up, and by that time she was come close to the ship's side, looking earnestly on the men. A little after, a sea came and overturned her. From the navel upward, her back and breasts were like a woman's, as they say that saw her; her body as big as one of us; her skin very white; and long hair hanging down behind, of colour black. In her going down they saw her tail, which was like the tail of a porpoise, and speckled like a mackerel. Their names that saw her were Thomas Hilles and Robert Rayner."[93]

Whatever explanation be attempted of this apparition, the ordinary resource of seal or walrus will not avail here. Seals and walruses must have been as familiar to these Polar mariners as cows to a dairy-maid. Unless the whole story was a concerted lie between the two men, reasonless and objectless,—and the worthy old navigator doubtless knew the character of his men,—they must have seen, in the black-haired, white-skinned creature, some form of being as yet unrecognised.

Steller, a zoologist of some repute, who examined the natural history of the Siberian seas, reports having seen, near Behring's Straits, a strange animal, which he calls a Sea-ape. "It was about five feet long, with a head like a dog's; the ears sharp and erect, and the eyes large; on both lips it had a kind of beard; the form of the body was thick and round, but tapering to the tail, which was bifurcated, with the upper lobe longest; the body was covered with thick hair, grey on the back, and red on the belly. Steller could not discover any feet or paws. It was full of frolic, and sported in the manner of a monkey, swimming sometimes on one side of the ship and sometimes on the other, and looking at it with seeming surprise. It would come so near the ship that it might be touched with a pole; but if any one stirred, it would immediately retire. It often raised one third of its body above the water, and stood upright for a considerable time; then suddenly darted under the ship, and appeared in the same attitude on the other side; this it would repeat for thirty times together. It would frequently bring up a sea plant, not unlike a bottle-gourd, which it would toss about and catch again in its mouth, playing numberless fantastic tricks with it."

There is nothing in this description which would exclude it from well-recognised zoological classification. It is highly probable that it was one of the seal tribe, but of a species, perhaps a genus, not yet identified. All analogy would suggest that fore-paws must have been present in an animal with a dog-like head, and clothed with hair; but they were perhaps small,—smaller even than in other PhocadÆ, and may have been so concealed in the long hair, or held so closely pressed to the body, as not to be visible. The only other difficulty is in the posterior extremity. This is described by Steller in terms that imply a true piscine tail, expanded in a direction vertical to the plane of the body, and of that peculiar form called heterocercal, which distinguishes the cartilaginous families of Fishes, the Sharks and Rays. But the animal was indubitably a Mammal; and therefore we may almost with certainty assume that, if the body terminated in a natatory expansion, it would be, as in the whales, and manatees, a horizontal expansion, and not a vertical one. But if the strange creature was indeed, as I conclude, of the Phocine type, we have only to suppose the tail, which is usually very small in this family, to have been so greatly developed, as to exceed the united hind feet, which may have been small, and the appearance, seen momentarily, and in the wash of the waves, might well seem that of a heterocercal tail.

Captain Weddell, well known for his geographical discoveries in the extreme south of the globe, relates the following story: "A boat's crew were employed on Hall's Island, when one of the crew, left to take care of some produce, saw an animal whose voice was even musical. The sailor had lain down, and about ten o'clock he heard a noise resembling human cries; and as daylight in these latitudes never disappears at this season, he rose and looked around; but, on seeing no person, returned to bed; presently he heard the noise again; rose a second time, but still saw nothing. Conceiving, however, the possibility of a boat being upset, and that some of the crew might be clinging to some detached rocks, he walked along the beach a few steps, and heard the noise more distinctly, but in a musical strain. Upon searching round he saw an object lying on a rock a dozen yards from the shore, at which he was somewhat frightened. The face and shoulders appeared of human form, and of a reddish colour; over the shoulders hung long green hair; the tail resembled that of the seal, but the extremities of the arms he could not see distinctly. The creature continued to make a musical noise while he gazed about two minutes, and on perceiving him it disappeared in an instant. Immediately when the man saw his officer, he told this wild tale, and to add weight to his testimony, (being a Romanist,) he made a cross on the sand which he kissed, as making oath to the truth of his statement. When I saw him, he told the story in so clear and positive a manner, making oath to its truth, that I concluded he must really have seen the animal he described, or that it must have been the effects of a disturbed imagination."[94]

The green hair in this description is the most suspicious element; it is so exactly that attributed to the poetical mermaids, and so entirely without precedent in the whole range of known zoology,—that, if taken literally, I fear it would condemn the narrative. But among the Antarctic seals, both golden yellow fur, and black fur, are found; and if hairs of these two colours were about equally intermingled, the result would be an olive-green, as we see in some of the monkeys; and then some allowance must doubtless be made for imagination, in one little accustomed to precise observation, and "somewhat frightened" withal. I should say, with little hesitation, that this creature was of the seal family, only that the seaman's daily habits brought him into the most familiar contact with various kinds of seals; and, unless the animal in question had differed notably from such as he was acquainted with, he would not have been so affected by the phenomenon. In such stories, the sorts of creatures familiar to the observation of the narrator, and the amount of surprise produced in his mind by the stranger,—must always be carefully estimated, as important elements in the formation of our judgment.

To come nearer home, Pontoppidan records the appearance of a merman, which was deposed to on oath by the observers: "About a mile from the coast of Denmark, near Landscrona, three sailors, observing something like a dead body floating in the water, rowed towards it. When they came within seven or eight fathoms, it still appeared as at first, for it had not stirred; but at that instant it sunk, and came up almost immediately in the same place. Upon this, out of fear, they lay still, and then let the boat float, that they might the better examine the monster, which, by the help of the current, came nearer and nearer to them. He turned his face and stared at them, which gave them a good opportunity of examining him narrowly. He stood in the same place for seven or eight minutes, and was seen above the water breast high. At last they grew apprehensive of some danger, and began to retire; upon which the monster blew up his cheeks, and made a kind of lowing noise, and then dived from their view. In regard to his form, they declare in their affidavits, which were regularly taken and recorded, that he appeared like an old man, strong-limbed, with broad shoulders, but his arms they could not see. His head was small in proportion to his body, and had short curled black hair, which did not reach below his ears; his eyes lay deep in his head, and he had a meagre face, with a black beard; about the body downwards this merman was quite pointed like a fish."[95]

But the most remarkable story that I know of in recent times, is that adduced by Dr Robert Hamilton, in his able History of the Whales and Seals, in the Naturalist's Library, he himself vouching for its general truth, from personal knowledge of some of the parties: "It was reported that a fishing-boat, off the island of Yell, one of the Shetland group, had captured a mermaid by its getting entangled in the lines!! The statement is, that the animal was about three feet long, the upper part of the body resembling the human, with protuberant mammÆ like a woman; the face, the forehead, and neck, were short and resembling those of a monkey; the arms, which were small, were kept folded across the breast; the fingers were distinct, not webbed; a few stiff long bristles were on the top of the head, extending down to the shoulders, and these it could erect and depress at pleasure, something like a crest. The inferior part of the body was like a fish. The skin was smooth, and of a grey colour. It offered no resistance, nor attempted to bite, but uttered a low plaintive sound. The crew, six in number, took it within their boat, but superstition getting the better of curiosity, they carefully disentangled it from the lines, and a hook which had accidentally fastened in its body, and returned it to its native element. It instantly dived, descending in a perpendicular direction.

"After writing the above, (we are informed) the narrator had an interview with the skipper of the boat and one of the crew, from whom he learned the following additional particulars. They had the animal for three hours within the boat; the body was without scales or hair; was of a silvery grey colour above, and white below, like the human skin; no gills were observed; nor fins on the back or belly. The tail was like that of the dog-fish: the mammÆ were about as large as those of a woman; the mouth and lips were very distinct, and resembled the human.

"This communication was from Mr Edmonston, a well-known and intelligent observer, to the distinguished Professor of Natural History in the Edinburgh University, and Mr E. adds a few reflections, which are so pertinent, that we shall avail ourselves of them. That a very peculiar animal has been taken, no one can doubt. It was seen and handled by six men, on one occasion, and for some time, not one of whom dreams of a doubt of its being a mermaid. If it were supposed that their fears magnified its supposed resemblance to the human form, it must at all events be admitted that there was some ground for exciting these fears. But no such fears were likely to be entertained; for the mermaid is not an object of terror to the fisherman; it is rather a welcome guest, and danger is to be apprehended only from its experiencing bad treatment. The usual resources of scepticism, that the seals and other sea-animals, appearing under certain circumstances, operating on an excited imagination, and so producing ocular illusion, cannot avail here. It is quite impossible that, under the circumstances, six Shetland fishermen could commit such a mistake."[96]

There is, no doubt, much in this account which signally distinguishes it from all other statements with which it can be compared, except that of Hudson's sailors, with which it well coincides. The protuberant mammÆ, resembling those of a woman; the human, or at least simian face, forehead, and neck, and especially the mouth and lips; the distinct unwebbed fingers; the erectile crest of bristles; the nature of the surface,—without scales or hair; the colour; and the tail,—like that of a fish;—are all very remarkable points; and unless we conclude the entire story to be a lie, a mere barefaced hoax,—must necessarily indicate a creature of which scientific zoology knows absolutely nothing.

It is observable that, here again, the tail is said to have been piscine and heterocercal, "like that of the dog-fish:" while the naked skin, and the colour—silvery grey above and white below,—will well agree with the characteristics common to the smaller SqualidÆ.

It is a pity that an account like this, avouched by six witnesses, was not thoroughly sifted. I have no doubt that, if a person tolerably conversant with zoology, and accustomed to the habit of cross-examination, had examined these six eye-witnesses separately, making full notes of what each could remember to have observed, and had then checked each deposition by all the others, a mass of testimony would have been accumulated that would in an instant have convinced any candid inquirer what measure of truth lay in the story. Points in which the whole six, or even three or four, agreed, might unhesitatingly have been set down as correct: suggestive questions, (not, however, suggesting the sort of answer,) as, "Had the creature so and so, or so and so?" could not have received the same reply from all the deponents, without being worthy of credence: even the points on which they would have differed might themselves have been instructive to an intelligent inquirer. I do not know that any such precautionary measures were resorted to in this case, and the tale must remain as we get it; but I make these observations for the purpose of suggesting, in the event of any similar occurrence, the advantage of separate examination in getting at the truth. On a review of the whole evidence, I do not judge that this single story is a sufficient foundation for believing in the existence of mermaids; but, taken into combination with other statements, it induces a strong suspicion that the northern seas may hold forms of life as yet uncatalogued by science.