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RHINOCEROS 



RHINOCEROS BICORNIS 

 Swahili : Kifaru. Masai : E-Muny 



HE common two -horned rhinoceros 

 "looks very fierce, but is an awful 

 ass! 



That is what a small boy might say 

 as a start for an essay at school, but it sums the 

 animal up "in one," as they say. 



He is like a large pig, black and hairless, has 

 small pig eyes, and his upper lip has a prehensile 

 tip to it. The curve of the lower jaw makes him 

 look as if he were perpetually smiling. His horns 

 are of a peculiar nature ; the tips and two-thirds 

 of the length look like horn till they are cut 

 through sectionally, when they seem to be a mass 

 of thickly coagulated hairs. And the fact that 

 they are really composed of hair is borne out 

 by their lower third part, from which the coarse 

 ends of hair stick out till the base seems to be 

 covered with cocoa-nut matting. Also when a 

 beast is killed it will be found that his horns just 

 move when pulled hard. They have to be cut 

 off with a hatchet, bone and all, but after a day 



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