The Blue Grotto of Capri by Esther Singleton

(_ITALY_) / ALEXANDRE DUMAS

We were surrounded by five and twenty boatmen, each of whom exerted / himself to get our custom: these were the _ciceroni_ of the Blue / Grotto. I chose one and Jadin another, for you must have a boat and a / boatman to get there, the opening being so low and so narrow that one / cannot enter unless in a very small boat.

The sea was calm, nevertheless, even in this beautiful weather it broke / with such force against the belt of rocks surrounding the island that / our barks bounded as if in a tempest, and we were obliged to lie down / and cling to the sides to avoid being thrown into the sea. At last, / after three-quarters of an hour of navigation, during which we skirted / about one-sixth of the island's circumference, our boatmen informed / us of our arrival. We looked about us, but we could not perceive the / slightest suspicion of a grotto until we made out with difficulty a / little black, circular point above the foaming waves: this was the / orifice of the vault.

The first sight of this entrance was not reässuring: you could not / understand how it was possible to clear it without breaking your / head against the rocks. As the question seemed important enough for / discussion, I put it to my boatman, who replied that we were perfectly / right in remaining seated now, but presently we must lie down to avoid / the danger. We had not come so far as this to flinch. It was my turn / first; my boatman advanced, rowing with precaution and indicating that, / accustomed as he was to the work, he could not regard it as exempt / from danger. As for me, from the position that I occupied, I could see / nothing but the sky; soon I felt myself rising upon a wave, the boat / slid down it rapidly, and I saw nothing but a rock that seemed for a / second to weigh upon my breast. Then, suddenly, I found myself in a / grotto so marvellous that I gave a cry of astonishment, and I jumped up / so quickly to look about me that I nearly capsized the boat.

In reality, before me, around me, above me, under me, and behind me / were marvels of which no description can give an idea, and before / which, the brush itself, the grand preserver of human memories, is / powerless. You must imagine an immense cavern entirely of azure, just / as if God had amused himself by making a pavilion with fragments of / the firmament; water so limpid, so transparent, and so pure that you / seemed floating upon dense air; from the ceiling stalactites hanging / like inverted pyramids; in the background a golden sand mingled with / submarine vegetation; along the walls which were bathed by the water / there were trees of coral with irregular and dazzling branches; at / the sea-entrance, a tiny point -- a star -- let in the half-light that / illumines this fairy palace; finally, at the opposite end, a kind of / stage arranged like the throne of a splendid goddess who has chosen one / of the wonders of the world for her baths.

At this moment the entire grotto assumed a deeper hue, darkening as the / earth does when a cloud passes across the sun at brightest noontide. / It was caused by Jadin, who entered in his turn and whose boat closed / the mouth of the cavern. Soon he was thrown near me by the force of the / wave that had lifted him up; the grotto recovered its beautiful shade / of azure; and his boat stopped tremblingly near mine, for this sea, so / agitated and obstreperous outside, breathes here as serenely and gently / as a lake.

In all probability the Blue Grotto was unknown to the ancients. No / poet speaks of it, and certainly, with their marvellous imagination, / the Greeks would not have neglected making of it the palace of / some sea-goddess with a musical name and leaving some story to us. / Suetonius, who describes for us with so much detail the Thermes and / baths of Tiberius, would certainly have devoted a few words to this / natural pool which the old emperor would doubtless have chosen as / the theatre for some of his monstrous pleasures. No, the ocean must / have been much higher at that epoch than it is at present, and this / marvellous sea-cave was known only to Amphitrite and her court of / Sirens, Naïads, and Tritons.

But sometimes Amphitrite is angered with the indiscreet travellers who / follow her into this retreat, just as Diana was when surprised by / Acteon. At such times the sea rises suddenly and closes the entrance / so effectually that those who have entered cannot leave. In this case, / they must wait until the wind, which has veered from east to west, / changes to south or north; and it has even happened that visitors, / who have come to spend twenty minutes in the Blue Grotto, have had to / remain two, three, and, even four, days. Therefore, the boatmen always / carry with them a certain portion of a kind of biscuit to nourish the / prisoners in the event of such an accident. With regard to water, / enough filters through two or three places in the grotto to prevent any / fear of thirst. I bestowed a few reproaches upon my boatman for having / waited so long to apprise me of so disquieting a fact; but he replied / with a charming _naïveté_:

"_Dame! excellence! _ If we told this to the visitors at first, only / half would come, and that would make the boatmen angry."

I admit that after this accidental information, I was seized with / a certain uneasiness, on account of which I found the Blue Grotto / infinitely less delightful than it had appeared to me at first. / Unfortunately, my boatman had told me these details just at the moment / when I was undressing to bathe in this water, which is so beautiful and / transparent that to attract the fisherman it would not need the song / of Goethe's poetical Undine. We were unwilling to waste any time in / preparations, and, wishing to enjoy ourselves as much as possible, we / both dived.