232 BERTHA'S VISIT TO HER 



ject of the unicorn ; and this morning we began by 

 searching for as much light on the subject as 

 our books could give us, that \ve might be the 

 better qualified to discuss it with my uncle. 



I found in Perceval's Cape of Good Hope, 

 that notwithstanding all the assertions he had 

 heard of the existence of this animal in Southern 

 Africa, he never met any person who had seen 

 one. A horn, nearly three feet long, was indeed 

 shewn him, as being that of the unicorn, but it 

 evidently belonged to a large species of antelope. 

 My uncle afterwards told us, that there is an 

 antelope of this kind in the mountains of India, 

 which the natives used to pretend had only a 

 single horn ; but since the conquest of Nepaul, 

 those mountains have been visited by English 

 officers, who have seen the animal alive with 

 both its horns. 



Frederick produced Mr. Barrow's description 

 of a drawing he had seen at the Cape, repre- 

 senting a single horn projecting from the fore- 

 head of an animal, which he says, resembles 

 a horse, with an elegantly shaped body, marked, 

 from the shoulders to the flanks, with longi- 

 tudinal stripes or bands. 



Mary had collected a great many facts about 

 the rhinoceros ; and she made it appear pretty 

 clearly, that the allusion in Scripture to the 

 strength and untameableness of the unicorn, are 

 much more applicable to the rhinoceros than to 



