“The insidious beauty of this place! Truly, it seemed to mock him—this
strangeness—this dark pool, surrounded on all sides by those wonderful,
soft, fir trees. And the water itself looking like a huge, black pearl
cast by some mighty hand, in anger possibly, in sport or phantasy
maybe, into the bottom of this valley of dark, green plush—and which
seemed bottomless as he gazed into it. . . .

And again he lowered his head and gazed into the fascinating and yet
treacherous depths of that magnetic, bluish, purple pool, which, as he
continued to gaze, seemed to change its form kaleidoscopically to a
large, crystalline ball. But what was that moving about in this
crystal? A form! It came nearer—clearer—and as it did so, he recognized
Roberta struggling and waving her thin white arms out of the water and
reaching toward him! God! How terrible! The expression on ther face!
What in God’s name was he thinking of anyway? Death! Murder!”

—Theodore Dreiser, An American Tragedy, 1925.