THE HIPPOPOTAMUS. 129 



still recent, a native fired on a hippopotamus, which 

 he missed, when the latter seized him in his jaws 

 and literally cut him in two. There is less exposure 

 to unpleasantness of this kind when the animal is 

 attacked from behind, seeing that he is so very slow in 

 turning round ; and the negroes usually avail them- 

 selves of this circumstance. 



III. 



HIPPOPOTAMI live partly in the water and partly on 

 land. They are only found in Africa, in the Nile and 

 in most of the rivers which empty into the Atlantic 

 and Indian Oceans. They abound chiefly south of the 

 equator and in the interior of Africa. They live in 

 herds during the day, in water, where they sleep and 

 yawn, elevating their muzzles from time to time above 

 the water ; at night they come on land to feed, taking 

 always the same path in going and coming. In walk- 

 ing their legs are so short and their paunch so volu- 

 minous, that it almost sweeps the ground. The water 

 is their true home. They are seen descending to the 

 bottom, walking and even running on the mud, rooting 

 up the long grasses with their hooked teeth. Salt, in 

 Abyssinia, saw them walking at the bottom of the Ta- 

 cage, at a depth of twenty feet. Ere long they ascend 

 to the surface, raise their heads out of the water, and 







