and then there is a splash as the youthful form, diving into the pool, is
instantaneously changed by the genius of the place into a
silver-glistening sea-god, the very image of the fisherman Glaucus sung of
old by Ovid, who became an Immortal and dwelt ever afterwards, according
to the ancient myth, in an azure palace beneath the sea. As the stripling
rises to the surface all glittering to breathe the air, his head turns
from frosted silver to ebon blackness, as does likewise his hand, raised
from the water to clasp the boat's prow. Slowly we are propelled round the
lofty domed cavern, and are shown the little beach at its further
extremity with its mysterious and unexplored flight of stone steps, down
which, so our mariner informs us, the wicked Timberio used to descend from
his villa at Damecuta, hundreds of feet overhead, to take a plunge in
these enchanted waters. The Emperor and his friends may or may not have
gambolled in this jewelled bath; but certain it is that Tiberius knew of
the existence of this unique cavern; and equally certain that an artistic
but demented potentate of our own days was so smitten with the idea of
owning a secret staircase descending to a blue grotto, that he must needs
construct within the walls of a fantastic castle in the highlands of
Bavaria an artificial counterpart of the Grotta Azzurra, with metal swans
moved by clockwork swimming thereon!

Our genial boatman beguiles the time of our returning by a long story,
told him in his boyhood by his old grandfather, of how two English
_Signori_ had managed to rediscover the entrance to the Blue Grotto, which
had been lost since the days of the Emperor Timberio, and how in
expectation of the Englishmen's reward a plucky sailor, named Ferrara, had
made his way all round the island in a cask, trying to force an entrance
into every possible cavern, until at last he hit upon the mouth of the
Grotta Azzurra itself, and thus gained the prize. But as a matter of fact
the existence of the Grotto was never wholly forgotten, for its beauties
were certainly known to the old Italian chronicler Capaccio. Yet doubtless
during the long period of the Napoleonic wars, when Capri from its
strategic position became a choice bone of contention between French,
English and Neapolitan forces, there were few if any persons who possessed
the courage or curiosity to visit the cavern; with the result that its
_exact_ locality became temporarily lost. It was known, how