The Loveliest of All

The third sister swam up a broad river that emptied into the sea. She saw lovely green hills covered with grapevines, castles and farms peeped out among great forests. The funny dolphins had turned summer salts and the big whales had spouted water through their nostrils so it looked like hundreds of fountains all around. But now that as grown girls they were permitted to go up there whenever they liked and no longer mattered to them. They longed again for home but after a month they said it was the most beautiful down where they lived and that home was the best of all.