The little book 'Sea Monsters Unmasked,' recently issued as one of the Handbooks in connection with the Great International Fisheries Exhibition has met with so favourable a reception, that I have been honoured by the request to continue the subject, and to treat also of some of the Fables of the Sea, which once were universally believed, and even now are not utterly extinct. The topic is not here exhausted. Other sea fables and fallacies might be mentioned and explained; but the amount of letter-press, and the number of illustrations that can be printed without loss for the small sum of one shilling--the price at which these Handbooks are uniformly published--is necessarily limited. I have, therefore, thought it better to endeavour to make each chapter as complete as possible than to crowd into the space allotted to me a greater variety of subjects less fully and carefully discussed. I have the pleasure of acknowledging the kind assistance I have again received in the matter of illustrations. I gratefully appreciate Mr. Murray's permission to use the woodcut of Hercules slaying the Hydra, taken from Smith's 'Classical Dictionary,' and those of the golden ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycenae, and figured in the very interesting book in which his excavations there are described. I have also to thank the proprietors of the _Illustrated London News_, the _Leisure Hour_, and _Land and Water_, for the use of illustrations especially mentioned in the text. HENRY LEE. SAVAGE CLUB; _Sept. 4th, 1883_. CONTENTS. PAGE THE MERMAID 1 THE LERNEAN HYDRA 48 SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS 59 THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES 62 THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS 76 BARNACLE GEESE--GOOSE BARNACLES 98 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. FIG. PAGE A MERMAID. _From a picture by Otto Sinding_ _Frontispiece_ 1. NOAH, HIS WIFE AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED DEITIES. 2 _From a gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet_ 2. HEA, OR NOAH, THE GOD OF THE FLOOD. _Khorsabad_ 3 3. DAGON. _From a bas-relief. Nimroud_ 4 4. DAGON: HALF MAN, HALF FISH. _From Lamy's 'Apparatus 5 Biblicus'_ 5. DAGON. _From an agate signet. Nineveh_ " 6. FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU. _After Calmet and Maurice_ 6 7. ATERGATIS, THE GODDESS OF THE SYRIANS. _From a 8 Phoenician Coin_ 8. VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS. _After 9 Calmet_ 9. VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. _From two 10 Corinthian Coins_ 10. DITTO. 11 11. SEAL, DRAWN AS A FISH. _From the Catacombs at Rome_ "