NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 57 



phantoms to the Deformed transformed, upon the 

 adjuration of the Stranger to the 



Demons heroic — 



Demons who wore 

 The form of the Stoic 



Or Sophist of yore — 

 Or the shape of each victor 



From Macedon's boy. 



We must leave the magic land of apparitions for the 

 realities of nature, and introduce such of our readers as 

 feel inclined to the introduction, to the other pachyder- 

 matous form, which we hope soon to behold alive in the 

 flesh, the'lTTTTos- Troxa/u-ios of the Greeks. 



What an uncouth form it is, propped upon four short 

 huge legs, looking like a gigantic wine-skin fit for the 

 revels of Polyphemus ! 



' The Hippopotamus' — are there not more than one 

 species? 



That there are several fossil species* there is no 

 doubt; but whether more than one species now exists is 

 a vexed question. 



M. Desmoulins names two — Hippopotamus Capensis, 

 and H. Senegalensis — resting his distinction, as he says, 

 on osteological discrepancies as strong as those on which 

 Cuvier depended, when he separated the great fossil 

 hippopotamus from the recent species existing at the 

 Cape. Nay, M. Desmoulins goes farther, not only ex- 

 pressing an opinion that it is not impossible that the 

 hippopotamus of the Nile differs from the two above 

 mentioned, but hinting that there may be two species in 

 that river. The difference of colour observed by M. 

 Caillaud, who found among forty Jiippopotaiini living in 

 the Upper Nile two or three of a bluish-black hue, while 

 the rest were reddish, seems to be the foundation on 

 which M. Desmoulins built his last-named suggestion. 



* Hippopotami major, mimitus, medius, for example. 



d3 



