40 RHINOCEROSES 



numbers, and mentions having observed on one occasion upwards of 

 a dozen on a patch of young grass, though he speaks of such a sight 

 as being unusual. 



"During one short hunting-trip in 1847 or 1848 Messrs. Oswell 

 and Vardon are credited with having killed no less than eighty-nine 

 rhinoceroses, the majority of which were probably of this species. 

 During his travels between 1850 and 1854 Mr. C. J. Andersson also 

 found these rhinoceroses very numerous in the district lying west and 

 north-west of Lake Ngami, and writes of having killed nearly sixty 

 head of this species during one season. He also mentions the fact 

 of nine of these animals having been killed in one day by a single 

 European near Walfish Bay. 



"In 1871, the date of my first visit to South Africa, the range of 

 the white rhinoceros had been much reduced, but these animals were 

 still numerous in the uninhabited districts of Matabililand, Mashonaland, 

 Gazaland, and Zululand, as well as in some portions of the eastern and 

 south-eastern Transvaal. In August 1872 I first saw its fresh tracks 

 near Mangwe, about 60 miles south-west of Bulawayo, and a month 

 later met with the white rhinoceros farther to the north-west. At that 

 time it was still numerous in this part of the country ; and while 

 elephant-hunting during the last three months of the year between 

 the Gwelo and Umniati rivers I saw white rhinoceroses almost daily, 

 sometimes as many as six or eight in one day. In 1873 I found 

 them abundant to the south of the mountainous tract of country 

 extending eastwards from the Victoria Falls to the junction of the 

 Gwai and Tchangani rivers. In the following year, when hunting on 

 the south bank of the Chobi, white rhinoceroses were not uncommon ; 

 but in 1877, during several months spent in the same district, only the 

 tracks of two were seen ; while in 1879, during eight months' hunting 

 on and between the Botlitli, Mababi, Machabi, Sunta, and upper 

 Chobi rivers, not even the spoor was seen, and the bushmen said there 

 were no white rhinoceroses left. In July 1884, however, while I was 

 camped near the reed-bed in which the Mababi river loses itself, some 

 natives came on a white rhinoceros crossing the foot-path on its way 

 back from the pool where it had been drinking. From the fact that 

 it came to drink in the middle of the day, this animal must have been 

 very thirsty, and had probably come from some ' vley ' in the desert- 

 country to the south which had recently dried up. Although I 

 followed its tracks for a long way, I never either heard or saw anything 

 of it ; and it probably went down the Tamalakan towards the Botlitli. 

 This is the last white rhinoceros of which I heard in western South Africa. 



