The Common Hippopotam 



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most viciously, and, after capsizing them, will sometimes pursue and kill by 

 a bite one or more of their occupants. A hippopotamus cow with a very 

 small calf attacked a canoe of mine on the Upper Zambesi in 1888. She 

 first came up beneath it, throwing one end out of the water, then made a 

 second attack, and, raising her huge head aloft, laid it across the canoe and 

 sank it. 



This was in October, and the little calf I have mentioned could only 



have been newly born, but whether this is the usual time of year for 

 hippopotami to calve, or whether they calve every year, I do not know. 

 When very young, hippopotamus calves seem to stand on their mothers' 

 shoulders in the water, as sometimes a tiny head will be seen to appear on 

 the surface and take breath, just before the mother's head is raised a little 

 in front of it. Hippopotami may usually be seen in small herds of from 

 four or five to a dozen together, but I have repeatedly seen as many as 

 twenty, or even thirty in one herd. The old bulls often live alone, and 

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