Page:Syria, the land of Lebanon (1914).djvu/57

THE CITY OF SATURN that three seas lay beneath him; the blue Mediterranean, the yellow waste of sand and the silvery surface of the olive forest which floods the fertile plain.

Near the lighthouse on the point, where perpendicular cliffs rise two hundred feet out of the Mediterranean, the storm waves have cut a number of lofty caverns. The water in most of these is so filled with fallen rocks that, except when the sea is absolutely calm, it is unsafe to take a boat into them; but the series of deep, gloomy caves is a challenge to the swimmer. Beneath the surface of the crystal water can be seen huge boulders covered with brilliant sea-anemones and sharp-spined sea-urchins. From the liquid pavement the roof arches up into the darkness like the nave of an old cathedral, or like some ruined palace of Neptune. Occasional ledges provide convenient resting-places where one can sit and watch the pigeons flying in and out, or listen to the twitter of the swallows and the chatter of the frightened bats. The caves sometimes harbor larger denizens than these. More than once, when swimming before them, I have been startled to see the dog-like head of a seal appear in the water close beside me.

Slanting up into the walls of these caverns are narrow tunnels where the softer rock has been worn away by the seeping of the surface water from above. If one cares to risk losing a little skin from the elbows and knees, it is possible to climb many [ 31 ]