CHAP. IX.] BULK OF THE RHINOCEEOS. 279 



intolerable ; they know that you do not want to shoot 

 them, and will often sit in front of your screen and 

 stare you in the face. Sometimes, whilst straining 

 your eyes at the dimly seen bushes about you, the 

 branched stem of one gi-adually forms itself into the 

 graceful head of some small antelope. The change is 

 like that of a dissolving view, the object had been under 

 youi- notice for a minute, yet you could not tell when 

 it ceased to be a bush and became an annual. The 

 young rhinoceroses must be much chased by the 

 hyenas and wild dogs, for you never find one, either 

 yoimg or old, whose ears do not show marks of having 

 been sadly bitten. 



I do not thiok an elephant gives anything like the 

 idea of bulk and power that the white rliinoceros does. 

 An elephant is so short, and so high upon his legs, that 

 he looks what jockeys would call " weedy " in com- 

 parison to the low and solid rliinoceros. The largest 

 of these that we shot was eighteen feet long and six high ; 

 the head and neck forming, I should say, a third of the 

 entire length. If a creature of this size be imagined 

 against the wall of a room, an idea may be formed of his 

 immense size. Their rush is wonderfully quick ; they 

 seem to me to get up their speed much quicker than 

 a horse or any other animal I know. I really think 

 that if a rhinoceros and horse caught sight of one 

 another at the same instant, when not more than ten 

 yards apart, the beast would catch the steed. Their 

 movements are amazingly rapid when they receive a 

 bullet. 

 Oct. 7 th. I had a most picturesque finale to a rhinoceros 



