The heat of the sun soon became too intense even for passive support. I
therefore rose, and sought the shelter of one of the arcades. Wandering
along from one to another of these, wherever my heedless steps led me,
and wondering everywhere at the simple magnificence of the building, I
arrived at another hall, the roof of which was of a pale blue, spangled
with constellations of silver stars, and supported by porphyry pillars
of a paler red than ordinary.--In this house (I may remark in passing),
silver seemed everywhere preferred to gold; and such was the purity of
the air, that it showed nowhere signs of tarnishing.--The whole of the
floor of this hall, except a narrow path behind the pillars, paved with
black, was hollowed into a huge basin, many feet deep, and filled with
the purest, most liquid and radiant water. The sides of the basin were
white marble, and the bottom was paved with all kinds of refulgent
stones, of every shape and hue.
In their arrangement, you would have supposed, at first sight, that
there was no design, for they seemed to lie as if cast there from
careless and playful hands; but it was a most harmonious confusion; and
as I looked at the play of their colours, especially when the waters
were in motion, I came at last to feel as if not one little pebble could
be displaced, without injuring the effect of the whole. Beneath this
floor of the water, lay the reflection of the blue inverted roof,
fretted with its silver stars, like a second deeper sea, clasping and
upholding the first. The fairy bath was probably fed from the fountain
in the court. Led by an irresistible desire, I undressed, and plunged
into the water. It clothed me as with a new sense and its object both in
one. The waters lay so close to me, they seemed to enter and revive my
heart. I rose to the surface, shook the water from my hair, and swam as
in a rainbow, amid the coruscations of the gems below seen through the
agitation caused by my motion. Then, with open eyes, I dived, and swam
beneath the surface.
And here was a new wonder. For the basin, thus
beheld, appeared to extend on all sides like a sea, with here and there
groups as of ocean rocks, hollowed by ceaseless billows into wondrous
caves and grotesque pinnacles. Around the caves grew sea-weeds of all
hues, and the corals glowed between; while far off, I saw the glimmer
of what seemed to be creatures of human form at home in the waters. I
thought I had been enchanted; and that when I rose to the surface, I
should find myself miles from land, swimming alone upon a heaving
sea; but when my eyes emerged from the waters, I saw above me the blue
spangled vault, and the red pillars around. I dived again, and found
myself once more in the heart of a great sea. I then arose, and swam to
the edge, where I got out easily, for the water reached the very brim,
and, as I drew near washed in tiny waves over the black marble border. I
dressed, and went out, deeply refreshed.