Soon after they saw a great long fin moving slowly along and when they came near found a big flat fish like a skate, slowly skimming just below the surface so that only his two fins came above the water. They followed him around and actually herded him over towards Bill and Dwight in another boat. Next morning Don and Dwight and Doc went out to find one with two harpoons, plenty of rope and two kegs. They cruised around a little and soon saw a big ripple on the water, a ray going along with his fins sticking up in the air twenty inches. They struck with their harpoons and after a great splash the big ray just sank out of sight and pulled the rope and two kegs right down with him. They waited a long time and watched for him to rise, but when we came along in the launch Pawnee we said we would stay to look while they went to the ship for another harpooning outfit. We chased another big ray for almost half a mile before the others came back. Dwight took first shot, but the harpoon soon pulled out, and the big fish went sailing along the surface again. Then Don took a shot which held and he played out the rope, holding on to the end so that the ray had to tow the boat. Meanwhile Bill had come along in another skiff to see the excitement. Bill gave them a second harpoon which Dwight stuck in and then the fish towed the two boats for a time, every once in a while flipping up its tail and hunching its back to try to sweep off the ropes and harpoons. Gradually it swam back towards the ship and the men started their engine and forced it over that way. When it was quite near, we hurried to the boat to get the movie camera for Shorty, and I brought Dwight’s revolver to him. He shot it five times with a thirty-eight, and Bill put in five loads of heavy buck shot. Then it seemed to make a great effort and tried to swim down deep. Don held it with all his strength and would not let it go straight down. It flipped its wing and hit Don right across the shoulder and head twice but he never let go. Then it tried to spill over the boat by getting right under it. But finally they towed it near enough for the sailors to throw a rope down and get a line over it. It had been bleeding pretty heavily and there was a big trail of blood all the way to the shore, and some sharks were following this up. It measured eighteen feet across from wing to wing and weighed 2400 pounds. And after they started dissecting it they found an unborn ray that weighed 28 pounds and made a perfect specimen to preserve and take back to the New York Zoological Society. MOLTEN LAVA We were sailing along the east coast of Albemarle Island for we wanted to know if the volcano we had seen in eruption on Easter Sunday, nearly two months before, was still in eruption. We were almost there, practically on the Equator, and we recognized the columns of smoke half way up the side of the mountain.