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Coelacanths with hooks and Hnes. It could not be done. And now 

 it appeared that malaria-soaked, worm-ridden, bone-headed 

 blacks of the Comores had been doing exactly that for centuries 

 past, and not all the learned deductions of museum scientists 

 could unsay it. What is more, Coelacanths were no strange food 

 on the Comores. It was not even impossible that ancestors of 

 these very scientists may have eaten Coelacanth, for in the early 

 days of sail many British ships engaged in the spice trade with the 

 East called regularly at 'Johanna', as Anjouan was called in those 

 days. One British captain liked the place so much, he settled there 

 and had a famous garden. At Mutsamudu, deep water close to 

 land gave complete shelter from the hellish wind, and here the 

 ships revictualled and filled their tanks, while the crew banished 

 incipient scurvy with vitamin-rich tropical fruits. Slabs of salted 

 Coelacanth may well have been among the stores they took aboard. 

 Thinking of food brought me back to the present, and I got 

 up and gave the crew a snack of biscuits, cheese, and dried figs, 

 but could not eat myself. The cloud was still so dense that neither 

 land nor sea was visible. Though I was restless and overstrung, I 

 compelled myself to lie down again, and made a stern effort to 

 sleep ; but a sudden stab of intense pair! brought me to a sitting 

 position. From before we left Durban my ears had been trouble- 

 some, and now, after several severe spasms, this settled down to a 

 steady toothache in my right ear. This was a predicament, for 

 before the advent of penicillin I had once had an abcess there, 

 and it had not been a pleasant experience; and with all that lay 

 ahead another now would be a disaster of the first magnitude. 

 With anything of that kind treatment is a matter of hours, so I 

 went forward and told Blaauw of my predicament, and asked to 

 light the primus to sterilise a syringe for a penicillin injection, 

 for which everything was in my 'collecting-box'. Blaauw was 

 shaken, but I would not press the matter too strongly, as the 

 plane and our lives were his ultimate responsibility, and of course 

 the Coelacanth was with us now. It probably would not have 

 helped even if I had gone on, it was clear that I would have to 

 stick it. The agony was considerable, and I could scarcely sit, 

 let alone lie down. So I turned to a resort I have often employed 

 in such circumstances, which is to keep the mind so busy that it 

 does not register pain, and decided to use the remaining time 



