“My sisters call all mollusks and fish and crustaceans and reptiles stupid, as though there is no difference between the thoughtless herring and the cunning squid. They think we are higher creatures. They revel in the fact that we must rise from the depths for breath, like the porpoise. They shed tears often, just to prove we have lacrimal glands, unlike fish. They show their breasts in pride; they think we are live-bearers who would suckle our young BUt not one of us has had a chance to find out if that its so.”
The grading of beings presented by Sirena renders the mermaids grander relative to the other marine creatures. Tears are illustrative of the emotions which equate the mermaids to human beings. Furthermore, the course through which they respire is categorically superior. Breasts are pointers of the femaleness of the mermaids which means that they could be categorized under mammals.
“They carry rocks with them everywhere. They say if we come close, they will kill us; if we speak , they will kill us. Right now they are walking to the rocky side of the island, the side facing the ridge their ships crashed on.”
The men are the survivors of the ill-starred ship crash. Rocks are emblematical of the integral viciousness of human beings. Although the mermaids liberate them following the crash of their ship, the men display boundless fierceness which denotes that they do not value the Mermaids’ exertions to liberate them.
“The men return to the inlet. Instantly we sing, our voices rope of anguish, but if anything can win them, it is our song. ‘ Silence!’ The leader picks up a loose rock. “There is no fresh water on this island. There are no animals except three vultures. There are no plants but lilies. This is an uninhabitable island. A hell above ground.’ He throws the rock. It splashes in our midst.’ Damn you! Damn all of you! He picks up another rock and throws it as hard as he can.”
The leader typifies inferior leadership because he expresses fury instead of nurturing a rapport with the mermaids. He is ungrateful for the mermaids’ efforts to save them and to captivate them through their song. Psychoanalytically, the leader projects his wrath over the crash of the ship to the mermaids which is injurious to nurturing concord between the mermaids’ and the humans.
