HIPPOPOTAMUS AMPHIBIUS. 
lated towards the tail. The body almost cylindrical, and the nates are very 
full, and behind slightly arched ; the legs are remarkably short, so that when 
the animal is standing, the most depending part of the belly almost touches 
the ground ; the tail is short and moderately robust, — towards the point, ver- 
tically compressed and edged above and below with wiry hairs, — towards the 
base, nearly cylindrical ; teats two, placed close to each other, and pendent 
from the udder nearly on a line with the anterior edge of the hinder leg. On 
the lips there are a number of small tufts of fine hair, resembling pencils, each ot 
which, on emerging from the skin, generally consists of four or five hairs that 
afterwards split into several others; a few tufts of the same description also 
occur on the sides of the head ; the remains of single hairs also occur on the 
sides of the neck and body ; in young specimens, the number and length of 
the latter are greater than in adult ones ; the hairs fringing the upper and 
lower edges of the tail are rigid and short, and many of them fully half a 
line in diameter at the base. Feet rather small for the size of the animal, 
slightly depressed in front, and terminated anteriorly by four short, clumsy, 
and unconnected toes, each furnished with a small hoof ; behind the roots of 
the toes, the skin of the foot is loosely connected with the parts beneath, 
and is rather pliant and usually marked with several transverse furrows. 
DIMENSIONS. 
Feet. Inches. 
Length from the edge of the upper lip 
to the tip of the tail 11 4 
of the tail 1 1 
of the fore legs to the breast ... 1 10 
of the head 2 4^ 
Feet Inches. 
Length of the ear 0 3 
Height of the shoulder 4 8 
Circumference of the thickest part of 
the body 10 6 
The male and female, as far as colours are concerned, are nearly alike, but 
in regard to size they differ materially ; the male is always considerably larger 
than the female. 
Previously to the establishment of the Dutch colony at the Cape of Good Hope, Hippopo- 
tami existed in abundance in all the larger rivers of South Africa ; but no sooner did the 
colonists direct their attention to the hunting of them, than their numbers began to diminish, 
partly from the destruction which was effected by the dexterous employment of fire-arms, and 
partly from many individuals having soon migrated, owing to the fear which was excited by 
the newly introduced weapons. At present, scarcely one exists in any of the livers of the 
Cape colony, and even but very few in streams within a moderate distance of it. On the 
Expedition arriving in latitudes too remote to be readily reached by hunters furnished with file- 
arms, every large river was found to abound in specimens, and in those the animals appeared, 
as they probably did some two hundred years ago much nearer to the southern extemity of 
the continent, familiar, comparatively fearless of man, and generally prepared to survey, with 
curiosity, any intrusion upon their haunts. To convey some idea of the numbers in which they 
