Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1907-12-03
MERM|AIDS OF Legend
Sea Women That Were ye
For BY Ancient Writer
ORIGIN OF The DELI

These Traditional Creatures NJ
Re Probably Dusonss and Manasa~.
y Seal Maidens Of Fabie--Mermaie.s .!
Fiction snd the Seal Of Fact.
There is a decided fascination about
the mermaids Of legend. Considering
their traditional form, it does not seem
quite certain whether they can be In
cluded among the fair "humanities" of
old religion. but it would be extremely
Interesting to see one In all serious
ness the truths and poetry underlying
and inherent in the old myths are well
worth attention, but apart from these
there is something distinctly entertain
ing in the quasi Historical accounts
that we have Of mermaids and the he
roic attempts at railroads.&c. explana-
ton. The fancy has taken firmer hold
on popular Imagination than many of
the Cid legends. or course they are
recognized as nonexistent; but, unlike
the majority Of NEUROLOGICAL beings
they are invested eolloquialiy with a
sort of humorous reality.
A History Of the Netherlands gives
la circumstantial account of a great
/! tempest which washed ashore near
lHaarlem a sea woman" as she was
swimming about She was captured
and cleansed from the "sea moss that.
had grown about her. and became a.
| humanized creature, except that she;
was always trying to escape into the
water. And it is added, Many persons
worthy of credit have justified in their
writings that they had scene her in the
said toWne of HARLEM" In the six
teenth century off Ceylon some sailors
captured seven mermen and mer-
maids, !" several priests and physicians
testifying to the fact and the latter
leaving it on record that after exami-
nation and dissection they found the
external and internal structures resem-
bled those OF human beings. Hudson.
the famous navigator, declared that
his ships company had seen mer-
maid, the upper part Of her body; like
a woman, skin very white and long
black hair. An old Iceland history
tells of one near Greenland, 'sthe neck
and head in all respects ike human
being The Norwegian Bishop Pontip-
pidan, who wrote in the eighteenth cen
fury, records the appearance of a
mermaid which was deposed to on oath
by the observers. And not to multi
ply quotations proving the belief even
Of the learned in the actual existence
Of the mermaids. Pliny asserts author
itatively that aas for the merenaidens
it Is no fabulous tale that goeth 81
them. for locke how painters draw
them, so thay are indeed.
1t seems hard after all these weights
testimonies that we should be assured
that the historical mermaids were
only dugongs OF manatees. seals Of
sea lions. especially as some of these
1 interesting creatures measure some
eighteen feet In length and are by ne
means attractive in appearance. Some
thing In the shape OF the head and the
breast is relied on by the rationalistit
scientists as explaining the deiusion
but one is at a loss to understand how
this can account for the circumstan
tial descriptions that have come dowr
to us. CoevaIs Of those old writers
have proved to us by their paintings
that they held very much the same
1 views as to what constitutes feminine
1 beauty as we have, and we should
certainly not discover in the dugong o.
manatee any thing whatever to sugges
In the very faintest degree the idea O.
1 q pretty woman. Yet there is general
IL the implication Of comeliness In til,
verbal pictures the old writer's give
I of their mermafds, though Columbus
who reported that he had seen two O
1 three admitted that he saw no beaut.
iii them The seal explanation perhaps
1 does the least violence to ones tradi
4 tional ideas, as, whatever may b,
| thought of Its resemblance to wo
| man, 1t is IN itself graceful and its fac,
4 and eyes are pleasing. ss 5..E
There is, at any rate, rather sug
gestive coincidence in the view tina
the mermaid OF fiction Is the seal O
fact. for closely allied If not identica
4 with merlnaids were the seal maid
ems of thousand fables. The ac
I cepted tradition was that these maid
& ems assumed the form of seals, whicl
they could relinquish at any momen
by dfsesting themselves Of the seal
n skins. Only if while they were dis
porting themselves In quasi human
4 guise their seal integuments were stol
en- or hidden they would have to re
main as ..maidens" and could not re
sumo the form OF seals. We know o.
4 the authority of many song an,
4 legend that willingly or unwillingly
man has been
married to o mermaid
1 At the bottom of the deep blue sea.
but in the case Of the fortunate pun
Joiner OF a seal maiden's "troub blossom
disguise there was no need for sui
marine descent, She could quite CON
fOrtably live on Land and. indeed. ha,
to unless she found her sealskin agar