Liberia 



<^ 



hippopotamus is not such a deep bluish black as in the only 

 three or four stuffed specimens in museums (so at least I am 

 told by those who have seen it alive or freshly killed).^ It is 

 a bluish grey above, warming here and there into a purplish 

 tint, and on the belly changing into yellowish grey. 



The Liberian hippopotamus, especially where it is much 

 disturbed by man, is very nocturnal in its habits, concealing 

 itself in the daytime in the water or in the dense vegetation - 

 surrounding the streams, and coming out at night to feed. 

 It has been asserted by Biittikofer and others that it frequents 

 the water less than the big hippopotamus, and is more of a 

 torest-haunting animal; but this description is not borne out 

 by the natives or by other European observers, who all assert 

 that it frequents the streams nearly if not quite as much as 

 Its big brother.' It does, however, undoubtedly make con- 

 siderable journeys into the forest at night, and I should think 

 went farther away from the water than the big hippopotamus, 

 being ot course more agile in its movements. It is perhaps 

 only one-third the size of a full-grown specimen of the common 

 hippopotamus. 



The only recorded species of swine indigenous to liberia 

 is the handsome Red river hog. Dapper in his accounts of 

 the Grain Coast and the vicinity of Cape Mount states that 

 there are two kinds of wild pig in the country, the first being 

 the Red river hog and the second a much larger species, tall 

 and black of hair, with sharp tusks and of a very fierce 



1 Mr. Gow, however, writes : " The skin is about halt" an inch thick : very smooth 

 and chocolatc-coXonrcd." This refers to specimens he saw in 1904 in the Dukwia 

 River. 



- The Pygmy hippopotamus puslies its way through the dense herbage of 

 reeds, grass, marantaceous plants, giant arums, and bushes of diverse kinds so as 

 to form long tunnels (rather than paths) tlirougli the vegetation in which it often 

 remains concealed during the daytime. 



^ " Frequents the water very much." — Gow. 



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