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the natives' flimsy huts and savagely choked their last frenzied 

 screams. It was horrible to hear the triumphant roar that accom- 

 panied a kill ; we even had one of the brutes come and cough at us 

 early one morning from the top of a thicket-clad cliff as we worked 

 on the reef below. In the morning we would find their pug marks 

 near our bedroom window. It was not pleasant. 



The Portuguese had done their work well. Even in remote 

 lighthouses such as this the leaflet was posted for all to see. Again 

 and again some headman would show it, stuck on the pole of his 

 hut. As a treasured possession, it would sometimes be produced 

 from the inside of a fisherman's garment. There could have been 

 few even in those remote parts that had not heard about the 

 Coelacanth ; they all knew that ten thousand Escudos were offered 

 for this fish. To the natives all along the coast the Coelacanth is 

 now known as 'Dez Contos Peixe', i.e. 'Hundred Pound Fish'. 

 In our travels we came to realise that most of them doubted 

 whether there really was anyone so crazy as to pay that vast sum 

 for just one fish, and we tried to convince them. Added to that, 

 experience taught me that while the average native could recognise 

 a picture of a fish he already knew well, it was the exception for 

 one to be able to recognise an unknown fish from a picture. 



In 1 95 1 we worked over one of the wildest and least-known 

 parts of East Africa, the northern territory of Mozambique, 

 between Port Amelia and the Rovuma. This was one of the most 

 arduous of all our undertakings. Along the coast are a number of 

 islands, densely bushed but waterless and uninhabited. There 

 are no communications and no supplies ; from the point of view 

 of our work the normal conditions were difficult, as there is con- 

 stant high wind with occasional storms, currents are fierce, and 

 there is a rise and fall of 14 feet at spring tides. We lived and 

 voyaged all along those terrible shores in a small vessel provided 

 by the Portuguese ; indeed, we could never have done this work 

 but for their aid. Taking advantage of the few occasions when the 

 wind abated a trifle, we would rush from one island shelter to 

 another, often only precarious. Fishes, well, they were there in 

 millions, wonderful fishes so unsophisticated that they almost 

 climbed aboard themselves, and we got marvellous collections; 

 but never saw a trace of anything like a Coelacanth, nor had any 

 of the few humans we encountered, white or black. 



