171 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



MXTLTUNGUI.A COntillHl'd NASICORNIA (kHINOCEROs). 



Rhixoceros. — (ilap 46.) The distribution of the species of Rhinoceros corresponds with their 

 structural athnity. The characters chosen for chissification by some authors no doubt fail to show 

 this, but that is the fault of their selection of characters, and is not due to the absence of good 

 structural distinctions. For example, Dr. Giebel * divides them into species with two horns, species 

 with one horn, and species without horns ; an arrangement which has the effect of making a jumble 

 of all the species, Asiatic and African together, and, moreover, has no good structural foundation 

 on which to rest. No doubt the bones of tlic skull have a certain relation to the horn, being 

 formed so as to support it ; but the number of horns does not materially affect this ; the horns 

 are mere agglutinations of hair ; and in very old individuals of the two-horned species, both in 

 Africa and Asia, a third smaller horn sometimes makes its appearance. Classification on such 

 a basis could not be expected to lead to any true combination of affinities. 



Characters such as the possession of "permanent incisors in both jaws," and "no permanent 

 incisors in the upper jaw," have a very difi'orent significance and value, and separate the Asiatic 

 species entirely from the African; the Asiatic having incisors in the upper jaw, and the Atrican 

 none, or only milk teeth, which disappear early.f 



Of living species, five African and three Asiatic are known. The African are three black 

 ones and two white. 1. The Rh. Africanus {olim bicorxis, the Borele of the Cape colonists). 2. 

 The Rh. keiti.oa Smith, a second black species. 3. Rh. cucullatus Wagner, from the High- 

 lands of Ethiopia. 4. The "White Rhinoceros, Rh. simus Biitrh. ; and 5. A second white species, 

 Rn. OswEi.i.ii E/Ziot ; all with two horns. These African species fall natuT-ally into two groups 

 — those which browse on trees and those which graze, distinguished readily by a jirehensile or 

 non-prehensile upper lip. There may be a sixth with only one horn. Mr. Edwaid lUylh, in his 

 paper "On the Living Asiatic Species of Rhinoceroses," says, "Sir Andrew Smith assured me 

 that he had been repeatedly told by the natives that such an animal occurred in the regions 

 north w:ird of the tropic of Capricorn." J And Mons. F. Fresnol, then Consul of France at Jidda 

 (Djidda),§ some thne since published an elaborate letter, " Sur rexistence d'luie esp6ce Unicorne 

 de Rhinoceros dans la partie tropieale de rAfritpie," the infonnati.ni In \\lii(!i may very possibly 

 be well founded. 



♦ fiiebcl, D. C. G. "Die Siiugethicre in Zoologisclier I E. Blytii, in " .Toiirn. A.siat. Soc.'" IS(;2. Separate 



Anatoraisclier and Palajoutologisctior Bezithung." — Loip- I'opy, p. 3. 

 zig, ISr)!), vol. i. 197. § FRKSNKr,, iu '('(iniptrs Renilus," toin. xxvi. (1818), p. 



t Van der Hoeven, " Haiulljuuk of Z .ology." Claiku'a iM. 

 Translation, 1858, p. ()31. 



