Robert Main, age 11, of Tulsa, Okla., for his question:

WHAT ARE THE SEVEN SEAS?

A quick check of any world map will show you there are a lot more than seven seas around. You hit that number around Europe and Africa alone: the Baltic, North, Mediterranean, Black, Caspian, Red and Arabian seas.

A great many people believe the term Seven Seas refers to the North and South Pacific, the North and South Atlantic, the Arctic, Antarctic and the Indian oceans. They are wrong.

The term Seven Seas actually has no literal meaning. It was an expression that was used long before all of the world's oceans were known to exist. The expression means, simply enough, all of the seas and oceans of the world.