SOUTH AFRICA FIFTY YEARS AGO 85 



haps, I ought to say for we had then no friendly hippo in the 

 Zoo there was no mistaking him. 



I opened fire at once from my side at heads which showed 

 for a second above water and then disappeared below, again 

 to reappear ; and Murray kept pounding away from his. This 

 went on for a quarter of an hour, and nothing came of it ; 

 though the hippos were hit every time, not one of them seemed 

 to die there was, apparently, the same amount of snorting, 

 purring, and blowing but no results of the thirty or forty shots 

 that had been fired, and yet the animals were within twenty or 

 twenty-five yards of us. ' Have you killed any, old fellow ? ' 

 I shouted, and the answer came back to me, ' No ! ' At the 

 same moment a big bull made straight for the part of the bank 

 on which I was standing. Letting him get his forelegs clear 

 of the water, I fired within three feet of his head, blowing him 

 back, as it seemed, into the stream. ' Well, I'll swear I hit 

 him ! ' I roared to Murray. ' Oh, I've hit all I've fired at,' 

 was his reply. The evening was closing in, and just before we 

 started for the waggons one hippopotamus floated up dead on 

 Murray's side. We looked at one another, and did not say 

 much of our shooting. Next morning, however, on the surface 

 of the creek lay fourteen huge bodies a hippopotamus sinks 

 to the bottom when killed, and only floats when the gas 

 distends the stomach ; at least, that was our reading of the 

 riddle. It is the poorest of sport, and I never shot another 

 except for food. The young are very good eating, the flesh 

 resembling the most delicate pork. 



We knew nothing about the tusks when we shot this first 

 batch, and so lost some valuable ivory. Large hippopotamus' 

 teeth were then worth 2os. a lb., when elephant ivory would 

 bring only $s. 6d., the former, I believe, being used for the 

 finest sort of inlaying and artificial teeth. 1 



The hippopotamus and crocodile live together in the same 



1 Sir S. Baker tells me these prices are altered now, and that in 1892 

 elephant ivory fetches from jar. to i8.r. a pound, and hippo's only from $s. 

 to IO.T. , as the dentists have given up using it. 



