ARE RHINOCEROS DIFFICULT TO KILL? 83 



All rhinoceros delight in swamps, and lie in mud-holes for 

 the greater part of the day. In a good-sized mud-hole one 

 day I saw a rhinoceros lying at one end, and a buffalo at the 

 other. I have never shot the lesser rhinoceros on the right 

 bank of the Brahmapootra, but I have no doubt it exists, as 

 it is also found in the Soonderbunds not far from Calcutta ; 

 but it is fairly plentiful on the left bank south of Goalparah, 

 where I have killed it. 



As a rule, rhinoceros are inoffensive ; they do a good deal 

 of damage to grain if any is grown within a reasonable dis- 

 tance of their haunts, but generally they inhabit such remote 

 localities that they can do no harm. It is naturally a timid 

 animal, more anxious to escape than fight, and it is by no 

 means difficult to kill. Of course, when a rhinoceros has 

 been severely wounded and is closely followed up, it will turn ; 

 but so will a rat, or, as they say, even a worm ; but its principal 

 anxiety is to get away and lie in some mud-hole, where it 

 wallows, and where it probably dies.^ The horn is only used 

 for grubbing up roots ; when they wish to attack they use 

 their incisors, which with them answer much the same purpose 

 as tushes in a boar. They can inflict a clean deep cut, and 

 they appear at certain seasons to fight amongst themselves, 

 for I have killed both males and females scored all over. 



It used to be said that the skin of the rhinoceros will 

 resist an ordinary ball, but that is all sheer nonsense; a 

 spherical ball out of a smooth-bore, if rightly placed, will kill 

 one of these animals far easier than it will a buffalo. It is not 

 the hide, but the enormous muscles, mass of flesh and bones, 

 that cover the vital organs, that render the use of heavy rifles 

 and immense charges so necessary to penetration. But as 

 Von Hohnel killed two rhinoceros in East Africa with one 

 ball, using a Mannlicher rifle, a similar weapon should account 

 for them in the East. Colonel Campbell, an old Assamese 

 shikarie, had the credit of also having killed two rhinoceros 

 with one ball ; but it was not quite certain, for he did fire two 

 shots, but at animals some way apart; whereas the two killed 

 were standing alongside of one another. I have sent a 

 hardened bullet right through one. 



If the bullet, with a sufficiency of powder behind it, is 

 placed in the centre of the shield over the shoulder, rather 



