74 Wild Life in Central Africa. 



The sun and water were warm, and I thought he would 

 come to the surface in less than two hours, so I went back 

 to the village and attacked the lunch my cook Yakobo had 

 prepared. After I had fared I attended to some bad 

 blisters on my feet, and when I was busy at this Mankanga,. 

 whom I had left to watch, came and told me that the hippo 

 had risen. I looked at my watch and found that the 

 time this animal had remained below w r ater Avas less than 

 an hour. Once in the Zambesi I shot four hippo which 

 came up in about the same time, and, again, I have known 

 others to remain below the surface for over five hours. 

 It depends on several conditions. Great heat and the 

 fatness of a hippo make it rise quickly. A cold atmo- 

 sphere, cold water, and a thin poor condition may keep 

 a hippo under for several hours. Heat causes gas to 

 generate more quickly in the stomach and entrails, and 

 this causes buoyancy. 



Some men then offered to swim out and attach a 

 long bark rope to one of the hippo's legs, but, before 

 allowing them to do so, I asked several of the villagers 

 whether there were any crocodiles in this part of the Bua r 

 for I knew that some parts were infested with these 

 loathsome creatures, and some nine years before I had 

 foolishly stood in the Bua almost up to my armpits 

 shooting at hippo. 



On that occasion some creature scraped against my bare 

 legs and made me get out of the water very quickly. 

 It may only have been a fish or a water turtle, but the 

 following day, on getting a hippo out, I found that its skin 

 was scored with the teeth of crocodiles, so I cannot help 

 thinking that a small crocodile intended to seize one of my 

 legs and may have been frightened by a movement or 

 their white colour. 



Anyhow, I have never again risked standing long in a 

 river where I knew there were crocodiles, nor have I 

 allowed my natives to take such risks. 



If several men go in together and splash hard they 

 frighten the crocodiles away, and on this occasion I told two 



