Deep in the blue ocean lived the Sea King with his three daughters. The youngest mermaid was the loveliest. She had found the statue of a handsome boy in a shipwreck and built a lovely garden around it.
The sisters could go to the surface of the sea only when they were fifteen. And while the two elder ones saw the wonders on the surface, the little mermaid heard the stories of ships and people and forests from her grandmother.
On her fifteenth birthday, the excited mermaid came to the surface and looked around in great wonder. She saw a ship with many people celebrating and dancing on it. Among them she saw a prince as handsome as the statue she had in her garden. But a sudden storm upset the ship and it sank, taking everyone on board also into the sea.
The mermaid was horrified to see the prince also drowning. She dived to save him and found that he had lost consciousness. But she took him to the shore and laid him safely there.
She was waiting for the prince to regain his consciousness when she heard the sound of some girls talking. The little mermaid hid behind a rock. One of the girls, seeing the prince, ran up to him. The prince revived and smiled at the girl. They went off together. And the mermaid returned sadly to the castle in the sea. She decided to seek the help of the Sea Witch to win the prince.
When she reached the house of the Sea Witch, braving whirlpools, sea animals and plants, the witch agreed to change her fishtail into a pair of legs. “But,” she warned the mermaid, “walking is going to be extremely painful till the prince accepts you. If he accepts you, you will become fully human. But if he marries someone else, the next morning, your heart will be broken and you will become the foam on the waves.”
The mermaid was so much in love that she agreed. But the Witch had to be paid in return for what she was giving the little mermaid. “Give me your sweet voice,” she demanded. And the little mermaid gave her the sweet voice she had.
The Sea Witch made a concoction in her cauldron and gave it to the mermaid in a little jar. Then she said magic words that captured her voice in another jar.
The little mermaid swam to the surface and reaching the shore, she drank the potion from the jar. It seemed to burn her throat, and she fainted. But when awoke in the morning, she found she was like the girls on land, with legs!
The Prince found her there and, he was so fascinated by her beauty that he took her to his palace and looked after her with great care. The mermaid found every step painful and she could not explain anything to the prince either, because she had given her voice to the Sea Witch.
One day, she heard the church bells pealing, as the Prince came to meet her. He invited her to his wedding. “I’m marrying the girl who saved my life when I was drowning,” he explained, not realising that it was the little mermaid who had saved him!
Silently, with her heart breaking into pieces, the little mermaid attended his wedding as bridesmaid. Her eyes filled with tears and she knew that she would soon just be foam on the waves.
After the wedding, when the Prince and his bride had gone, she walked to the east and waited for sunrise on the shore. At dawn she dived into the water. But strangely enough, she did not change into foam!
There were beautiful sprites floating around her. “Come, my dear!” they said, “We are spirits who do good in the world, and when we do enough good, then each of us is given a soul and taken to live in heaven!”
“How have I become one of you?” asked the little mermaid in wonder.
“You gave up everything that was dear to you for love, my dear,” explained the spirits. The mermaid joyously flew off with the spirits. She would earn a soul and live in heaven peacefully!
