332 OUT OF DOORS. 



may have done so at night ; for many of those animals 

 are exceedingly shy and wary, and will not even feed if 

 they think that they can be seen. 



In the present case, however, there is scarcely any 

 doubt that the little hippopotamus took no nourish- 

 ment at all. Either it did not know where to seek 

 food, or its mother was too stupid to show it, for it did 

 attempt to extract milk from her ears, but naturally 

 failed. Two days having thus passed, it was evident 

 that unless the young one could be separated from its 

 mother and artificially fed it must inevitably die ; but 

 the difficulty lay in the mode of separation. To rob a 

 mother of her young is proverbially dangerous ; and 

 when the mother is a savage, cross-grained beast, weigh- 

 ing some three tons, and capable of ' chawing up a 

 human ' with the greatest ease, the task is peculiarly 

 perilous. 



On Tuesday, the 9th, an attempt was made to get 

 the mother away from her child. The two were lying 

 on the ground, at some little distance from the water ; 

 and it was thought that if the mother could be decoyed 

 into the pond, it might be possible to abstract the young 

 calf before she could get out again. Now this creature 

 is emphatically a good hater. She hates all kinds of 

 things and persons. She hates workmen without their 

 coats. I once saw her charge at a workman, and bite 

 at the iron bars so savagely that she broke one of her 

 enormous teeth completely into the jaw. But if there- 

 be one thing she hates beyond all it is the garden 



