2866 Quadrupeds. 



ters well understood her movements, and rested not till the little one 

 broke cover and plunged headlong in the river. Another plunge took 

 place at the same instant ; a boat-hook was plunged in his fat side, 

 and there he was held till one of the hunters took him up, like a great 

 over-grown dropsical baby, in his arms, and put him gently into the 

 boat. The party duly estimated the value of their prize ; they healed 

 his wound, and brought him by easy journeys down the Nile to Cairo, 

 feeding him on milk, of which he consumed an inordinate allowance, 

 creating a dearth of that precious article in an unsophisticated land 

 where its manufacture is yet unknown, and where the natives depend 

 on their milch kine for the principal supply. His residence at Cairo 

 was a perpetual triumph ; he was the observed of all observers, for 

 to the cockneys of Cairo the hippopotamus was as great a novelty as 

 to those of London. Embarked on board the Ripon, public admira- 

 tion was divided between him and his fellow-passengers, the black 

 princes : he submitted to receive this divided homage with much 

 resignation, sitting sedately on his haunches and curling up his 

 mouth into a sardonic smile. He passed the ordeal of special train 

 and special van with perfect nonchalance, and, arrived at the gates of 

 the gardens in Regent's Park, he exchanged a few grunts with 

 his Arab keeper, and waddled off in his wake, for all the world like 

 a prize pig following his feeder for his diurnal allowance of moist- 

 ened meal, to the inexpressible relief of our worthy secretary, Mr. 

 Mitchell, who, as commander-in-chief of the proceedings, had been 

 deeply pondering the perils and casualities of the transit. Once, and 

 once only, the stranger cast a wistful eye at the turbid waters of the 

 Regent's Canal as though he longed for a plunge : for a moment our 

 hearts, to use a beautiful metaphor, were in our mouths : but no ! he 

 abandoned the insane idea as soon as formed, and waddled on after 

 the Arab, as before. 



Next morning Mr. Hippopotamus began to hold levees : among 

 his earliest visitors we observed the great Professor Owen, who 

 appeared to be jotting down hard words about his thews and 

 muscles, for some abstruse repository of science : Harrison Weir, 

 pencil in hand, taking his effigy for the Lady's Paper; by the way, 

 we peeped over the shoulder of the cunning limner, and found him 

 touching up the picturesque figure of the Arab with infinite gusto, 

 doubtless concluding, with a profound knowledge of human nature, 

 that the ladies would prefer the man to the beast : the Wolff, his eve 

 following every movement of the creature as he rolled upon the waters 

 of his bath, trusting to his inimitable pencil to transfer that broad 



