Sylvia Myers, age 10, of Florence, S.C., for her question:

What do mermaids look like?

Nobody knows what a mermaid looks like, because nobody has ever seen one. True, there are pictures and even a famous statue of a mermaid. But there is not one genuine true to life photograph. Sad to say, there are no mermaids and there never were any. Dragons, unicorns and monstrous sea serpents never existed either. All of them are imaginary animals that people invented ages ago.

Most likely the mermaid was invented by a lonely sailor. Perhaps he mistook a sun bathing seal for a girl  because that is what he wanted to see. This tale of a strange sea maiden would be very popular because everybody wanted to believe it. In time, lots of people did believe it. They even agreed on what the imaginary mermaid was like: Her top half was a human Girl and the rest of her was a big fishy tail. It's nice to pretend    but the mermaid never really existed.