THE RHINOCEROS OF THE LADO 



463 



just at noon, utterly indifferent to the heat. There were 

 hippo both in the bay and in the river. All night long 

 we could hear them splashing, snorting, and grunting; 

 they were very noisy, sometimes uttering a strange, long- 

 drawn bellow, a little like the exhaust of a giant steam- 

 pipe, once or twice whinnying or neighing; but usually 

 making a succession of grunts, or bubbling squeals through 

 the nostrils. The long grass was traversed in all directions 



Camp in the Lado 

 From a photograph by J. Alden Loring 



by elephant trails, and there was much fresh sign of the 

 huge beasts their dung, and the wrecked trees on which 

 they had been feeding; and there was sign of buffalo also. 

 In middle Africa, thanks to wise legislation, and to the 

 very limited size of the areas open to true settlement, there 

 has been no such reckless, wholesale slaughter of big game 

 as that which has brought the once wonderful big game 

 fauna of South Africa to the verge of extinction. In certain 

 small areas of middle Africa, of course, it has gone; but 

 as a whole it has not much diminished, some species have 

 actually increased, and none is in danger of immediate 

 extinction, unless it be the white rhinoceros. During the 

 last decade, for instance, the buffalo have been recovering 



