horn of its
bristles. With the exception of a tuft at the extremity of the ears and
tail, it had no hair on its body. Its eyes were absurdly small; indeed,
at a little distance one could scarcely see them. We agreed that, what
with its giant body, misshapen head, ungainly legs and feet, and
absurdly small eyes, it was, according to our notions, the very image of
ugliness. Next to the elephant, the white rhinoceros is the largest
animal in existence, and scarcely inferior to it in strength, as this
one had proved by the way in which it pushed on the huge waggon.
Notwithstanding its ungainly appearance, it had shown us how active it
could be, by the way it had turned about when assailed by the dogs, and
the rapid charge it made towards the camp; indeed, I believe even a fast
horse, with a rider on his back, could only keep pace with it. Senhor
Silva told us it cannot go long without water, and it is, therefore,
always found in the neighbourhood of some pond or fountain, which it
seeks at least once during the day, both to quench its thirst and to
wallow in the mud, in which amusement it delights. Probably it is thus
able to get rid of the insects which cling to its hide. We measured the
animal, and found that it was nearly sixteen feet in length, from the
snout to the end of the tail, and twelve feet in circumference. It is
said to attain the age of one hundred years; indeed, judging from its
horns, the old fellow we killed must have been nearly as old. The body
was long and thick; the belly hanging nearly to the ground, and of great
size. Its legs were short, round, and very strong; and its hoofs were
divided into three parts, each pointing forward. The head was
especially large, the ears long and erect, and its small eyes deeply
sunk. The horns of the rhinoceros are composed of a mass of fine
longitudinal threads, forming a hard solid substance, not secured to the
skull, but merely attached to the skin. They rest, however, on a bony
protuberance near the nostrils. The white rhinoceros, of which I have
been speaking, has an extraordinary prolongation of the head, which we
found to be nearly one-third of the length of the whole body. Its nose
was square, and the after horn of considerable length. The horn of the
black rhinoceros is much shorter, and the animal itself is smaller than
the white species. There are, however, four species of rhinoceros--two
black, or of a dark colour; and two of a whitish hue.