In the process of developing ideas for a "mermaid" commission I have several pages of sketchbook research on mermaids. Seeing the pew-end carving of the mermaid in Zennor Church was seminal and reference to M.W.Tisdall's "God's Beasts" suggests that mermaids are evil creatures and that the fish in each hand are Christians who have met an unfortunate fate in the hands of the Evil One, or have been lured away from the straight and narrow path. I wish to convey a more benign creature without evil intentions. If sometimes they appear menacing that is because they are doing their job assisting the dead into the underworld.