eaned her white arms on the edge of the
vessel and looked towards the east for the first blush of morning--for
that first ray of the dawn which was to be her death. She saw her
sisters rising out of the flood. They were as pale as she, but their
beautiful hair no longer waved in the wind; it had been cut off.

"We have given our hair to the witch," said they, "to obtain help for
you, that you may not die to-night. She has given us a knife; see, it is
very sharp. Before the sun rises you must plunge it into the heart of
the prince. When the warm blood falls upon your feet they will grow
together again into a fish's tail, and you will once more be a mermaid
and can return to us to live out your three hundred years before you are
changed into the salt sea foam. Haste, then; either he or you must die
before sunrise. Our old grandmother mourns so for you that her white
hair is falling, as ours fell under the witch's scissors. Kill the
prince, and come back. Hasten! Do you not see the first red streaks in
the sky? In a few minutes the sun will rise, and you must die."

Then they sighed deeply and mournfully, and sank beneath the waves.

The little mermaid drew back the crimson curtain of the tent and beheld
the fair bride, whose head was resting on the prince's breast. She bent
down and kissed his noble brow, then looked at the sky, on which the
rosy dawn grew brighter and brighter. She glanced at the sharp knife and
again fixed her eyes on the prince, who whispered the name of his bride
in his dreams.

_She_ was in his thoughts, and the knife trembled in the hand of the
little mermaid--but she flung it far from her into the waves. The water
turned red where it fell, and the drops that spurted up looked like
blood. She cast one more lingering, half-fainting glance at the prince,
then threw herself from the ship into the sea and felt her body
dissolving into foam.

The sun rose above the waves, and his warm rays fell on the cold foam of
the little mermaid, who did not feel as if she were dying. She saw the
bright sun, and hundreds of transparent, beautiful creatures floating
around her--she could see through them the white sails of the ships and
the red clouds in the sky. Their speech was melodious, but could not be
heard by mortal ears--just as their bodies could not be seen by mortal
eyes. The little mermaid perceived that she had a body like theirs and
that she continued to rise higher and higher out of the foam. "Where