RHINOCEROS. 91 1 
occasioned a concussion that had stunned him for a 
minute, till the bleeding had recovered him.” 
The rhinoceros, like the hog, loves to wallow in 
the mire, where he enjoys the rubbing himself so 
much, and groans and grunts so loud, that he is 
heard at a considerable distance. The evening is 
the time he usually indulges himself in this plea- 
sure; and the enjoyment he receives from it, toge- 
ther with the approaching darkness of the night, 
deprives him of his usual vigilance and attention. 
The hunters, guided by his noise, steal secretly upon 
him, and, while lying on the ground, kill him with 
their javelins, by striking him in the belly; where 
the wound is mortal. 
The quantity of water which this creature re- 
quires to satisfy its thirst is so great, that, accord- 
ing to our Abyssinian traveller, no country but the 
Shangalla, deluged with six months’ rain, and full 
of large deep basins, made in the solid rock, and 
shaded by dark woods from evaporation, or watered 
by large and deep rivers, can supply the vast 
draughts of this monstrous animal. But it is not for 
drinking alone that he frequents wet and marshy 
places ; large, fierce, and strong as he is, he must 
submit to defend himself against the weakest of ad- 
versaries. The fly, (a species of oestrus,) that un- 
remitting persecutor of every animal that lives in 
the black earth , does not spare the rhinoceros, nor 
is afraid of his fierceness. It attacks him in the 
same manner as it does the camel, and would as 
easily subdue him, were it not for a stratagem prac- 
