DISSEI, BROWN ISLAND 55 



went down on to the sixteen-foot sand-bed, aimed calmly at 

 the immobile animal, fired, and waited for its reaction . . . 

 but no reaction came. The beast was stone dead. It was, I 

 believe, a rare specimen that we ran across only once again 

 during our time in the Red Sea, when one was captured at 

 Sciumma by Priscilla. It was high in the back, almost as 

 high as a stingray, and coloured a bright yellow ochre with 

 brown, grey and black spots. Its eyes protruded, cow-like, 

 while its skin and tail appeared to be armed with minutely 

 thin, very tough spikes. 



Giorgio Ravelli caught the first big moray-eel, a twenty- 

 pound one. As is well known, this huge serpent has a 

 poisonous bite. It put up such a violent and strenuous fight 

 that Giorgio confessed later that had he suspected the 

 dimensions of what lay behind that head protruding from 

 the corals, he would have left well alone. He pulled it out 

 with consummate technique, however, notwithstanding the 

 fact that he was a novice at the game of spear-gun fishing. 



There are various kinds of morays in the Red Sea, the 

 biggest and commonest being very similar to the Mediter- 

 ranean one, although a rather deeper brown in colour and 

 splashed with vague violet markings. Its proportions are 

 remarkable. A twenty-pound moray is not a ten-pound one 

 doubled. Its length is almost the same, but its girth is three 

 times as great. A twenty-pound moray is rarely more than 

 5 J feet in length, but it is as thick as a man's thigh, almost all 

 muscle and no bone. Another characteristic of the tropical 

 moray is its aggressiveness. It does not normally attack unless 

 disturbed, but once disturbed it springs. Alberto shot one 

 whose head was as usual only just showing out of its den. 

 He had planted the arrow badly, just under the skin. Instead 

 of drawing back, the moray rapidly seized the arrow and 

 with one bite tore it from its neck. Then with mouth wide 



