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[Le Blog Personnel de Professeur Arronax] November 5th 1867

From: Harry Hayfield <harryhayfield~at~googlemail.com>
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2010 12:31:21 -0800 (PST)
To: jvf~at~gilead.org.il

If there is one thing that is guaranteed to annoy me, it's a smart alec
animal. Whether it's a caribou in the Canadian prairies or this animal
we found yesterday, when you are tracking an animal and it takes great
pride in leading you a merry dance I can get most upset.

As an example, this animal made another appearance today and allowed us
to investigate it, when we determined it was only 250 feet long
(slightly shorter than the Captain of the Captains of the Shannon and
Helvetia would have us believe), and ejected water to a height of 120
feet thus confirming my initial guess that the animal was a mammal.
Once we had enough steam, we decided to try and capture it. Easier said
than done of course. Our first attempt saw us make no gain in distance
over 45 minutes, so naturally we sped up to 18 knots and still the
animal carried on ahead of us. The order came to increase speed (19
knots) but still no net progress so that over the course of four hours
we went nowhere!

If there is one thing I know about the Americans it is that when they
can't catch something, they decide to blow it up. Now, normally I would
oppose this but if it meant keeping that animal in one place long
enough to reach it I was in favour of the idea. The first shot missed,
but the second one found it's target and simply rolled off the back of
it and started another chase!

So here we are chasing it again and wondering if it's going to
condescend to let us catch it!

--
Posted By Harry Hayfield to Le Blog Personnel de Professeur Arronax on
1/06/2010 08:16:00 PM

Received on Wed 06 Jan 2010 - 22:31:29 IST

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