400 EXTINCT AND VANISHING MAMMALS 



harm, and there, at least, they may be allowed to remain in reason- 

 able number." 



Passing again to the westward, we find these animals few in 

 Uganda. Here their areas are very limited in extent, and within 

 these areas they "do not diminish in number, there is no trade in 

 their horns, and they are little used for food. It is probable that ... 

 not more than ten are killed in a year." (Coryndon, 1921, p. 28.) 



North of Uganda, rhinos are found as far as Mongalla, and the 

 north end of Lake Rudolf, and thence westward to the Ubangi- 

 Shari district and the French Cameroons, avoiding the rain-forest 

 areas of the Congo Basin. In the Ubangi-Shari district they have 

 been protected partly since 1916 and totally since 1933. L. Blancou 

 (in response to query in 1937) states that there are several groups, 

 totalling about fifty individuals in the Pare National and the ad- 

 joining game reserve, where they are strictly guarded. From official 

 sources (Ministry of Colonies, Paris, 1936, and Inspection of Waters 

 and Forests, Yaounde, 1937) it is learned that they are found mainly 

 in the north of the territory, in the region north of Maroua, where 

 estimates place the numbers at most as 120, probably less. Their 

 disappearance is laid to European and native hunting by the latter 

 for the sale of the horns. At the present time they are absolutely 

 protected by regulations. 



This species reaches its westward limit in the Lake Chad region 

 and eastern Nigeria. Here in the Yola Province north of the Benue 

 River, a few survivors "may still be encountered, though possibly 

 only a dozen specimens exist in the country; their bones, however, 

 are numerous in the Benue basin and on the Song plateau, while the 

 ingrained fear which the native has of 'Kilifou' shows that the species 

 was plentiful not very long ago" (Oakley, 1931, p. 34) . To much the 

 same effect adds Haywood (1932, p. 32) that "around the junction 

 of the Provinces Bornu, Adamawa, and Bauchi, it seems unlikely 

 that more that 50 at most survive. . . . Rhino are so scarce that 

 they should certainly not be allowed to be killed under any cir- 

 cumstances." 



The Black Rhino to the northeast of the Tana River and Lake 

 Rudolf is believed to represent a smaller and slightly different race, 

 somaliensis, although its distinctive characters do not seem very 

 well defined. It ranges at present, or did, not so many years ago, 

 into the Blue Nile Valley near the borders of Ethiopia, and into the 

 Rift Valley region of southern Ethiopia, as well as eastward into 

 British Somaliland. It is probably now much reduced in numbers 

 owing to constant hunting by the natives. In 1912, while the late 

 Dr. John C. Phillips and I were on the upper Blue Nile, we were told 

 that the animal was then rare. Tracks were occasionally reported 

 by native hunters, but of solitary adults, with no evidence of the 



