Giants on the Decline 99 



long. It is rather a bitter disappointment for a 

 hunter when he sees that he will have nothing to 

 keep belonging to an animal which he has killed. 

 Fortunately, this has not often happened to me, 

 and one of the finest specimens which I have in 

 my collection came from the very region of this 

 last hunt. I spent a fortnight there, and killed 

 four rhinoceros, two of which were very remarkable 

 for size, and had horns measuring, respectively, 23 

 inches and 12 inches, 25 inches and 13 inches. In 

 the matter of other game, I killed only two or three 

 roan antelopes, a wild boar, and a klipspringer. 



This country made a deep impression on me, like 

 the recollection of a region of giants, imposing in 

 its beauty and solitude. One cannot describe the 

 grandeur of certain landscapes in these countries. 

 At the foot of huge mountains are gray rocks of all 

 sizes, scattered over an immense inclined plane ; be- 

 tween them is vegetation which grows in the greatest 

 profusion; and in the midst of this wild nature, far 

 from the rest of the world, rhinoceros trample with 

 heavy step those quiet places which their extinct 

 ancestors trampled thousands of years ago. And is 

 not the rhinoceros itself already almost fabulous? Its 

 ugliness, its ever -increasing rarity, its quiet habits, 

 and its unsociability all contribute to making it a 

 mysterious and strange animal worthier of figuring 

 among mythological monsters, in Scandinavian tales, 

 or in Buddhist fables, than in reality. 



Contemplating the calm, majestic nature of that 

 country with its giant two-horned animals, as I have 



