WATER BOYS and an arrow pointing at a small circular mosaicked pool perhaps some six feet in diameter. The surface of the water scintillating with light from below. We came across this in the corner of a covered alley strewn about with shirts and socks and coats, trousers, hats and shoes. Piles of colour. The usual vast range of variety. Bubbles surface in the pool. Two boys appear, shiver a little, dry themselves, dress and run off. That’s when I noticed there had been among the clothes, hanging from heated rails, the most beautiful of towels. Miriad colours and designs. I wasted no more time, stripped off and plunged into the pool. A thing one should never do, but luck was with me, I shot past a group of boys rising to the surface. Perhaps more of what I saw below in later pages, enough now to say, a huge illuminated cavern mosaicked throughout in colours most precious to the eye. The whole entirely filled with filtered water. Within easy reach of a downward plunge or swim, and of a piece with the architecture of this place, small air chambers fresh with filtered air. These penetrated from below, small air chambers holding the water at the door. These cubicles sufficient in general for ten to fifteen boys. Thus with this plunge I began my exploration of the Water Hole, as I learnt to call this most magnificent of meeting places.