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earth with a bump, saying that they wanted me to say something 

 over the microphone, as the whole of South Africa was waiting 

 for me. It was only much later that I discovered that all pro- 

 grammes had been dislocated that evening for this purpose. This 

 was terrible. It was already 9 p.m., we had provisionally arranged 

 to take off at 3.30 a.m., and I was so weary that it was an effort to 

 utter any word at all. I looked at him in dismay, and said, 'What 

 must I say, man ?' 'Anything you like,' he said. 'Even just a mes- 

 sage.' I sat back and thought. If people were waiting and had been 

 waiting, a mere message was a poor return; they would want to 

 know what it was all about, and it was emphatically not a story to 

 be told in a few words. Suddenly I remembered my notes, and 

 told Moore I had made them and could use them to give an out- 

 line of events, but that it would take at least twenty minutes. 

 Instead of saying, as I hoped, that that was far too long, to my dis- 

 may he shouted, 'That will be fine. Professor, you take as long as 

 you like'; and there was no doubt that he meant it. The notes 

 were still in the plane, and with my directions one of the crew 

 went to seek them while I drank more hot coffee and tried to com- 

 pose my mind to the ordeal ahead. I must not make a hash of 

 this. Those notes were merely a sketchy scrawl. The man came 

 back, the sheets were pushed into my hand, and I sorted them out 

 V, hile those who filled the room shuffled and pressed tight around 

 me like a wall, though I could scarcely see them through the 

 black mists of weariness that enclosed me. I began to speak, or 

 rather to croak at the microphone, my throat muscles almost 

 refusing to function, and then suddenly I was no longer aware of 

 my surroundings but almost miraculously back in it all, living it 

 over again, the strain and agony and suspense. It was so real that 

 when I told how I had found myself weeping at my first sight of 

 the creature on Hunt's vessel, I was there again and even though 

 I knew that tears had again run from my eyes, I did not care. 

 Once from sheer exhaustion my voice failed completely, and I 

 had to stop and gesture for more coffee, then went on. At the end 

 I felt like a pricked balloon, and just sat hunched up while whirling 

 black mists shot with points of light submerged me, but Moore 

 brought me up by asking if I had any idea of the name I intended 

 to give this creature. I said, yes, to honour Dr. Malan, the genus 

 Malanitty and from the island Anjouan, where it was found, so 



