THE COASTS OF SICILY. 175 



marvellous transparency into the belief that I could 

 grasp some Annelid or Medusa, which seemed to be 

 swimming at only a few inches distance from me. 

 Our patrone watched the proceeding with a sarcastic 

 smile, and taking a long pole with a small net 

 attached to one of its extremities, he, to my intense 

 astonishment, plunged it many feet below the surface 

 before it came in contact with the objects which I 

 had imagined I could grasp in my hand. 



This marvellously limpid condition of the water 

 produced another charming illusion. Leaning over 

 the side of the boat, we could see flitting beneath 

 our eyes a vision of plains, valleys, and hills, in one 

 place with bare and rugged sides, in another, clothed 

 with verdant herbage, or dotted over with tufts of 

 brownish shrubs, and in all respects calling to mind 

 the distant view of a passing landscape. But it was 

 not the varied outlines of a terrestrial scene on which 

 our eyes were riveted, for we were scanning the 

 ruijsfed contour of rocks, more than a hundred feet 

 below us, amid submarine precipices, along which 

 the undulating sands, the sharply cut angles of 

 the stone, and the rich tufts of brightly coloured 

 red weeds and glossy fucus fronds, lay revealed 

 to sight with such incredible preciseness and clear- 

 ness, as completely to deprive us of the power of 

 separating the real from the ideal. After gazing 

 intently for a while at the picturesque scene beneath 

 our eyes, we scarcely perceived the intervening 

 liquid element which served for its atmosphere 

 and bore us on its clear surface. We seemed to be 

 suspended in empty space, or, rather, realising one 



