Page:Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 - Volume 2.djvu/281

 in the day the sun descending to set behind Ischia, strikes on the rocks and beach, and they become burningly hot.

P has got a nice sailing-boat over from Naples; too small, but still a wonderfully safe, good boat, considering its size, and we have a marinaro also from Naples, to whom it belongs; he takes care of it all day, and sleeps in it at night. He is a young fellow, and certainly never shows any signs of timidity, but considers his little skiff charmed from danger within the bay; beyond, the seas are far heavier; his father ha timore and will not let him venture. He tries to persuade us to go with him to Ischia and Capri. I am shy of this—the boat is so small; but P and his friend often sail some miles from shore, and run down to Castelamare; and on calm days I go on exploring expeditions into the frequent and strange caves of the coast, or stretch across to the Temple of Neptune, and roam about the ruin-strewed shore. These caverns are mysterious recesses, which the fancy is excited to people with a thousand fairy tales. As I have said, some are like ours of the Cocumella, scooped out in the face of the rock—others, narrow clefts in the rock, open to the sky. Into the strangest you enter by narrow passages, just large enough to let the boat pass; they are covered at top,