"That was the extraordinary thing. We actually did find the creature. We only caught a glimpse of it for a few seconds, slowly edging its way along a branch a couple of feet above our heads and looking down at us through the rain with a sort of serene incomprehension as to what kind of thing we might possibly be, but it was the kind of moment about which it is hard not to feel completely dizzy.
"Why?
Because, I realized later, I was a monkey looking at a lemur.
By flying from New York to Paris to Antananarivo by 747 jet, up to Diégo-Suarez in an old prop plane, driving to the port of Maroantsetra in an even older truck, crossing to Nosy Mangabé in a boat that was so old and dilapidated it was almost indistinguishable from driftwood, and finally walking by night into the ancient...