318 THE LIVING ANIMALS OF THE WORLD 



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A THREE-YEAR-OLD HIPPOPOTAMUS 



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THE HIPPOPOTAMUS 



By F. C. SELOUS 



Two species of the Hippopotamus Family exist 

 on the earth to-day, both of which are inhabitants 

 of Africa, and are not found in any other country ; 

 but the remains of many extinct forms of this genus 

 which have been discovered in various parts of Europe 

 and Asia show that in Pleistocene and Pliocene times 

 these strange and uncouth animals must have been 

 widely distributed throughout the greater part of the 

 Old World. The fossil remains of the large form of 

 hippopotamus which once frequented the lakes and 

 rivers of England and Western Europe cannot be 

 distinguished from the bones of the common African 

 species of to-day, which latter is possibly the only 

 animal in the world which has undergone no change 

 in form or structure since the prehistoric savages 

 of the Thames Valley threw stone-headed spears at 

 their enemies. 



The COMMON HIPPOPOTAMI'S, though it has long 



- been banished from the Lower Nile, and has more 



^ recently been practically exterminated in the British 



colonies south of the Limpopo, was once an inhabitant 

 of every lake and river throughout the entire African 

 Continent from the delta of the Nile to the neigh- 

 bourhood of Cape Town. Now it is not found below 



Khartum, on the Nile ; but in Southern Africa a few hippopotamuses are said still to exist in 

 the lower reaches of the Orange River. When Van Riebeck first landed at the Cape, in 1652, 

 he found some of these animals in the swamp now occupied by Church Square, in the centre 

 of Cape Town, and the last in the district was only killed in the Berg River, about seventy 

 miles north of that city, as recently as 1874. This animal, which had been protected for some 

 years, was at last shot, as it had become very savage, and was in the habit of attacking any 

 one who approached it. In my own experience I have met with the hippopotamus in all the 

 large rivers of Africa where I have travelled, such as the Zambesi, Kafukwc, Chobi, Sabi, 

 Limpopo, and Usutu, and also in most of the many large streams which take their rise on 

 the plateau of Matabililand and Mashonaland, and flow north, south, and east into the Zambesi, 

 the Limpopo, or the Sabi. I have also seen them in the sea, at the mouth of the Quillimani 

 River, and have heard from natives that they will travel by sea from the mouth of one river 

 to another. 



Hippopotamuses live either in families of a few individuals or in herds that may number 

 from twenty to thirty members. Old bulls are often met with alone, and cows when about 

 to calve will sometimes leave their companions and live for a time in seclusion, returning, 

 however, to the herd soon after the birth of their calves. Although, owing to the shortness 

 of its legs, a hippopotamus bull does not stand very high at the shoulder about 4 feet 

 8 inches being the average height yet its body is of enormous bulk. A male which died 

 some years ago in the Zoological Gardens of London measured 12 feet in length from the nose 

 to the root of the tail, and weighed 4 tons; and these dimensions are probably often exceeded 

 in a wild state. 



The huge mouth of the hippopotamus (see Coloured Plate), which the animal is fond of 

 opening to its widest extent, is furnished with very large canine and incisor teeth, which 

 are kept sharp by constantly grinding one against another, and thus enable their possessor 



