LIFE IN AN ISLAND. 101 



practised travellers. When we have passed the 

 cheerful Marina, and run, alarmingly close, along the 

 base of the great precipices towards the west, it is be- 

 wildering to see the Sorrento boats lie waiting oppo- 

 site a huge dead mass of rock, which looks as impene- 

 trable as an Alp, and shows no opening, unless that 

 tiny pigeon-hole on the level of the sea, three feet 

 high, and not much more wide, should happen to be 

 the gateway for which our boatman aims. There is 

 just width enough for a little boat to pass, and you 

 have to crouch down in the bottom, with your head 

 on a level with the seat you have just been occupy- 

 ing, as we shoot through the narrow gloomy arch. 

 Within you open your eyes upon a scene too solemnly 

 and mysteriously beautiful to be adequately described 

 by the wondering exclamation of " Fairyland ! " which 

 most people make on entering; denoting by that 

 word that they are altogether perplexed and be- 

 wildered for the moment by something beyond what 

 imagination has ever conceived. When you have re- 

 covered your senses after the first awe of that blue 

 twilight, the outlines of this strange temple of nature 

 grow clear that is, as clear as anything can be 

 through the azure mist, in which your neighbour's 

 face is as the face of a spirit, and flesh and blood 

 grow white and ethereal, sublimated out of all the 

 tints of life. It is the light that never was on sea or 

 land that dwells in this little sanctuary in the bosom 

 of the seas ; light not of the sun or the moon, but 



