MERSA NASI 95 



seventy hours were spent on underwater observation and 

 many more on observation on land. Left alone in Nasi's 

 house a few days after landing (our companions left us to set 

 up an advance post on the islands of Enteara and Cundabilu 

 and then go back to Massawa) we had to continue our work 

 in conditions of some discomfort. Water and food were 

 rationed and we had to make a seemingly endless series of 

 sacrifices great and small as patiently and as cheerfully as we 

 could. Winds and rain came, the sea got up, Gigi fell ill with 

 a tropical sore on his leg. Drinking water was warm and 

 rationed in spoonfuls. Apart from fish and spaghetti we had 

 nothing to eat. The expedition had left Italy poor, and poor, 

 very poor, it remained, especially for us of the scientific 

 group. Despite all this, we carried on with our work regularly 

 every day both in the sea and on land. 



The following notes are from my diary, written partly in 

 pencil and partly with a ball-pen, covered with finger marks 

 and stained with cofifee and other mysterious many-coloured 

 substances : 



^Friday. The coast of Mersa Nasi. We have collected a lot of 

 material and about fifty shells of different kinds; many cowries. 

 As usual, Cecco found twice as many as me at the beginning. I 

 furiously uprooted a dozen blocks of madrepore and turned them 

 over. I went back when the cloud had settled. Between the blocks 

 there were three or four brains (the 'brains' are the cerebriform 

 madrepores, existent in various species) . Under each one of these, 

 in the calcareous fold of the mantle, I saw two, three, four and up 

 to six cowries. I carried on and kept on finding them, although 

 only under the brains. I had, it seemed, discovered by pure 

 chance the daily habitat of the cowrie (these are nocturnal creat- 

 ures). I broke the news. Confirmations and exceptions proved the 

 discovery. Then I collected two magnificent asteroids (star fish) 

 fire-red and blue-spotted. Cecco went into the first southern gulf 

 at high tide, water 30-50 cm., arrived almost in the middle, saw 

 the fin of a guitar-fish (guitar-fish shark), waited for a shot with 

 his Browning, fired a couple of bullets and nipped it in the back. 



