148 THE WORLD OF ANIMAL LIFE 



forty individuals, which may be seen splashing and wallowing in 

 shallow water together, now sinking for a while beneath the 

 surface, and now coming ashore for an hour or two to feed. 



The huge tusk-like teeth of the hippopotamus give it a most 

 formidable appearance. But it is by no means of a savage dis- 

 position, and will rarely fight unless attacked. When wounded, 

 however, it becomes a terrible foe. Dr. Livingstone, the great 

 traveller, tells us that a furious onslaught was made upon a boat, 

 in which he himself was sitting, by a hippopotamus whose calf 

 had been killed on the previous day. So determined was the 

 charge of the infuriated animal that the fore part of the boat was 

 lifted completely out of the water, one of the oarsmen thrown into 

 the river, and the rest of the crew compelled to leap hurriedly 

 ashore. Some years ago, too, a boat in which four men were 

 seated was capsized by a wounded hippopotamus, and three of 

 the four were drowned. 



The hippopotamus feeds exclusively on vegetables, and its 

 great teeth enable it to shear away stems and branches almost as 

 stout as a man's arm. It is exceedingly mischievous in cultivated 

 ground, for, besides eating some five or six bushels of produce at 

 a single meal, it tramples down a broad pathway among the 

 crops, so that it destroys far more than it actually devours. 



When the track of a hippopotamus is found in a plantation, 

 the grower, knowing that the animal will almost certainly return, 

 suspends over its pathway a heavy block of wood, in the centre of 

 which is fastened a poisoned spear-head. This is held in position 

 by a cord made of twisted creepers, which is brought down and 

 fastened across the path in such a manner that the pressure of 

 the animal's body may release it. As soon as the hippopotamus 

 presses against the cord, the wooden block falls and drives the 

 poisoned blade deeply into its back, with the result that in the 

 course of a few hours the animal dies. 



Sometimes, too, the hippopotamus is taken in a pitfall not 

 unlike that in which the giraffe is trapped, but with a sharp stake 

 planted upright in the middle instead of the narrow wall of earth. 

 When a hippopotamus falls into one of these pits it is, of course, 

 impaled upon the stake, and very soon dies of its wound. 



