Vanished Continent

An Expedition to the Comoro Islands

Hutchinson / The Adventurers Club (1959). (First Published 1957)

Hardcover Book with Dust Jacket

The story of an Italian expedition to the Comoros and surrounding region translated by David Moore. This account of the eight-month journey was written by one member of the four-strong party, a naturalist named Franco Prosperi. They visited parts of Madagascar as well as Kenya, Zanzibar, the Comoro Islands, and Aldabra. The purpose of the trip is zoological, primarily to explore the idea that Madagascar was once connected both to the African and Asian mainlands.

Text from the Front Flap

The author or this book is a young Italian naturalist who, with three companions, set out on a fascinating mission to Madagascar, Zanzibar, and the other islands off the East coast of Africa – islands which, according to theory, were once joined to both Africa and Asia. The object of the trip was to study the animal-life and other natural features in the light of this theory, and the book contains a wealth of interesting and unusual details about these. But, above all, it is an account of their adventures which, though approached light-heartedly, were often dangerous. The author describes his own terrifying experience when, off Zanzibar, he was carried away by the tide, and all but failed in his attempt to gain the shore; he writes of the hazards of the voyage through the Comoros, of the horrifying experience of watching a giant turtle torn to pieces by a pack of killer whales, and of how, on one occasion, he and a colleague found themselves trapped in the middle of a 'fleet' of poisonous jelly-fish. He describes too the unusual sight, he was privileged to see, among them a living coelacanth and a mating between sharks, which is believed never to have been seen before. His book, with its wealth of interesting material, is written in a lively, humorous style which the reader will find wholly engaging.

Contents
Foreword
Chapter I Dar-es-Salaam
Chapter II The Phantom of the Waters
Chapter III The Fish that Drowns
Chapter IV White and Black Ants
Chapter V Honeymoon Island
Chapter VI A Fishing Lesson
Chapter VII The Lemurs of Zanzibar
Chapter VIII A Dramatic Adventure
Chapter IX The Outboard Motor
Chapter X The War of the Crabs
Chapter XI Towards the Island of the Moon
Chapter XII Grand Hotel at Moroni
Chapter XIII The Fauna of the Comoros
Chapter XIV The Sirens
Chapter XV Great Comoro
Chapter XVI On the Slopes of the Volcano
Chapter XVII Kartola
Chapter XVIII Taibu and Solima
Chapter XIX Sharks in Love
Chapter XX An Adventure with a Coelacanth
Chapter XXI Islands Sprung from the Sea
Chapter XXII The Orcs
Chapter XXIII Aldabra
Chapter XXIV Giant Tortoises
Chapter XXV The Lethal Navy
Chapter XXVI A Backward Glance
Chapter XXVII Kilimanjaro
Appendix
Index

Notes

Printed by The Anchor Press, Tiptree, Great Britain.
On the dust jacket the subtitle is given as "An Expedition to the Comoro Islands" while the title page gives "An Italian Expedition to the Comoro Islands".

Condition of Item

Very Good. Dust jacket with several chips and tears. Price clipped.

Refer to the glossary for definitions of terms used to describe the condition of items.

Photographs of the Item (Total: 4)

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Front Cover	Back Cover	Front Flap	Frontispiece

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