চাঁদের পাহাড়/পরিশিষ্ট
পরিশিষ্ট
সল্স্বেরি থাকতে সে সাউথ রোডেসিয়ান মিউজিয়ামের কিউরেটর প্রসিদ্ধ জবতত্ত্ববিদ্ ডাঃ ফিট্জেরাল্ডের সঙ্গে দেখা করেছিল, বিশেষ করে বুনিপের কথাটা তাঁকে বলবার জন্যে। দেশে ফিরে আসবার কিছুদিন পরে ডাঃ ফিট্জেরাল্ডএর কাছ থেকে নিম্নলিখিত পত্রখানা পায়।
Dear Mr. Chowdhury,
I am writing this letter to fulfil my promise to you to let you know what I thought about your report of a strange three toed monster in the wilds of the Richtersveldt Mountains. On looking up my files I find other similar accounts by explorers who had been to the region before you, specially by Sir Robert McCulloch, the famous naturalist, whose report has not yet been published, owing to his sudden and untimely death last year. On thinking the matter over, I am inclined to belive that the monster you saw was nothing more than a species of anthropoid ape, closely related to the gorilla, but much bigger in size and more savage than the specimens found in the Ruwenzori and Virunga Mountains. This species is becoming rarer and rarer every day, and such numbers as do exist are not easily to be got at on account of their shyness and the habit of hiding themselves in the depths of the high-altitude rain forests of the Richtersveldt. It is only the very fortunate traveller who gets glimpses of them, and I should think that in meeting them he runs risks proportionate to his good luck.
Congratulating you on both your luck and pluck.