306 MAMMALIA—RHINOCEROS. 
of the elephant; not so much on account of the matter, of which they make 
several works with the chisel, but for its substance, to which they attribute 
divers virtues, and medicinal properties. 'The white ones, as the most rare, 
are also those which they value most. Cups made of this horn are used 
to drink out of by many of the Indian princes, under the erroneous idea that 
when any poisonous fluid is put into them, the liquor will ferment and run 
over the top. 
The rhinoceros, without being ferocious or carnivorous, or even very 
wild, is nevertheless untamable. He is of the nature of a hog, blunt and 
grunting, without intellect, without sentiment, and without tractableness. 
These animals are also, like the hog, very much inclined to wallow in the 
mire; they like damp and marshy places, and seldom leave the banks of 
rivers. They are found in Asia, and Africa, in Bengal, Siam, Laos, in 
the Mogul dominions, in Sumatra, in Java, in Abyssinia, and about the 
Cape of Good Hope. The two-horned rhinoceros is only found in Africa. 
But, in general, the species is not so numerous, or so universally spread, as 
that of the elephant. The female brings forth but one young, and at a great 
distance of time. In the first month the rhinoceros is not much bigger than 
a large dog; he has not, when first brought forth, the horn on the nose, 
although the rudiment of it is seen in the fetus. When he is two years 
old, this horn is oniy an inch long; and in his sixth year it is about ten 
inches. And as some of these horns have been seen very near four feet 
long, it seems they grow till his middle age, and perhaps during the whole 
life of the animal, which must be long, since the rhinoceros described by 
Mr Parsons was not come to half his growth when he was two years old; 
which makes it probable, that this animal:lives, like a man, seventy or 
eighty years. : 
Without being useful, as the elephant, the rhinoceros is very hurtful, by 
the prodigious devastation which he makes in the fields. The skin is the 
most valuable part of this animal. His flesh is excellent, according to the 
taste of Indians and negroes. Kolben says, he has often eaten it with 
great pleasure. His skin makes the best and hardest leather in the world; 
and not only his horn, but all the other parts of his body, and even his 
blood, his urine, and his excrements,Mare esteemed as antidotes against 
poison, cr a remedy against several diseases; probably, however, all those 
virtues are imaginary. 
The rhinoceros feeds upon herbs, thistles, prickles, and shrubs; and he 
prefers this wild food to the sweet pasture of the verdant meadows: he is 
very fond of sugar-canes, and eats all sorts of corn. Having no taste what- 
ever for flesh, he does not molest small animals, neither fears the large 
ones, living generally in peace with them all, even with the tiger, who often 
accompanies him, without daring to attack him. 
The rhinoceroses do not herd together, nor march in troops, like the 
elephant; they are wilder, and more solitary, and perhaps more difficulé 
