II.--DICK BARTER'S YARN; OR, THE LAST OF THE MERMAIDS. Well, Dick began, you see I am an old salt, having sailed the seas for more than forty-nine years, and being entirely unaccustomed to living upon the land. By some accident or other, I found myself, in the winter of 1849, cook for a party of miners who were sluicing high up the North Fork of the American. We had a hard time all winter, and when spring opened, it was agreed that I and a comrade named Liehard should cross the summit and spend a week fishing at the lake. We took along an old Washoe Indian, who spoke Spanish, as a guide. This old man had formerly lived on the north margin of the lake, near where Tahoe City is now situated, and was perfectly familiar with all the most noted fishing grounds and chief points of interest throughout its entire circuit. We had hardly got started before he commenced telling us of a remarkable struggle, which he declared had been going on for many hundred years between a border tribe of Indians and the inhabitants of the lake, whom he designated as Water-men, or "_hombres de las aguas_." On asking if he really meant to say that human beings lived and breathed like fish in Lake Bigler, he declared without any hesitation that such was the fact; that he had often seen them; and went on to describe a terrific combat he witnessed a great many years ago, between a Pol-i-wog chief and _a man of the water_. On my expressing some doubt as to the veracity of the statement, he proffered to show us the very spot where it occurred; and at the same time expressed a belief that by manufacturing a whistle from the bark of the mountain chinquapin, and blowing it as the Pol-i-wogs did, we might entice some of their old enemies from the depths of the lake. My curiosity now being raised tip-toe, I proceeded to interrogate Juan more closely, and in answer I succeeded in obtaining the following curious particulars: The tribe of border Indians called the Pol-i-wogs were a sort of amphibious race, and a hybrid between the Pi-Utes and the mermaids of the lake. They were of a much lighter color than their progenitors, and were distinguished by a great many peculiar characteristics. Exceedingly few in number, and quarrelsome in the extreme, they resented every intrusion upon the waters of the lake as a personal affront, and made perpetual war upon neighboring tribes. Hence, as Juan remarked, they soon became extinct after the invasion of the Washoes. The last of them disappeared about twenty-five years ago. The most noted of their peculiarities were the following: