d only have seen
the water-babies. Then when the tide turned, he left the buoy, and swam
round and round in search of them: but in vain. Sometimes he thought he
heard them laughing: but it was only the laughter of the ripples. And
sometimes he thought he saw them at the bottom: but it was only white
and pink shells. And once he was sure he had found one, for he saw two
bright eyes peeping out of the sand. So he dived down, and began
scraping the sand away, and cried, "Don't hide; I do want some one to
play with so much!" And out jumped a great turbot with his ugly eyes and
mouth all awry, and flopped away along the bottom, knocking poor Tom
over. And he sat down at the bottom of the sea, and cried salt tears
from sheer disappointment.

To have come all this way, and faced so many dangers, and yet to find no
water-babies! How hard! Well, it did seem hard: but people, even little
babies, cannot have all they want without waiting for it, and working
for it too, my little man, as you will find out some day.

And Tom sat upon the buoy long days, long weeks, looking out to sea, and
wondering when the water-babies would come back; and yet they never
came.

Then he began to ask all the strange things which came in out of the sea
if they had seen any; and some said "Yes," and some said nothing at all.

He asked the bass and the pollock; but they were so greedy after the
shrimps that they did not care to answer him a word.

Then there came in a whole fleet of purple sea-snails, floating along,
each on a sponge full of foam, and Tom said, "Where do you come from,
you pretty creatures? and have you seen the water-babies?"

And the sea-snails answered, "Whence we come we know not; and whither we
are going, who can tell? We float out our life in the mid-ocean, with
the warm sunshine above our heads, and the warm gulf-stream below; and
that is enough for us. Yes; perhaps we have seen the water-babies. We
have seen many strange things as we sailed along." And they floated
away, the happy stupid things, and all went ashore upon the sands.

Then there came in a great lazy sunfish, as big as a fat pig cut in
half; and he seemed to have been cut in half too, and squeezed in a
clothes-press till he was flat; but to all his big body and big fins he
had only a little rabbit's mouth, no bigger than Tom's; and, when Tom
questioned him, he answered in a little squeaky feeble voice:

"I'm sure I don't know; I've lost my way. I meant to go