THE HOME OF THE RHINO 
107 
vogue invariably describe the rhino as being one of 
the most dangerous of African animals. A charg¬ 
ing rhino, a wounded lion, a cape buffalo, and a 
frenzied elephant are the four terrors of the Afri¬ 
can hunters. All other forms of danger are slight 
compared with these, and I was full to the guards 
with a vast and fearful respect for the rhino. I 
fancied myself spinning around like a pinwheel 
with the horn of a rhino as a pivot, and the thought 
had little to commend itself to a lover of longevity 
—such as myself, for instance. 
After going to Africa and meeting some of the 
best members of the rhino set I was able to form 
some conclusions of my own, chief of which is the 
belief that he is dangerous only if he hits you. As 
long as you can keep out of his reach you are in no 
great danger except from the thorns. 
The prevailing estimate of the rhino is that he is 
an inoffensive creature who likes to bask under the 
shade of a tree and watch the years go parading by. 
His thick skin and fierce armament of horns seem 
to make of him a relic of some long-forgotten age 
—the last survivor of the time when mammoths and 
dinosauruses roamed the manless waste and time 
was counted in geological terms instead of days and 
minutes. His eyes are dimmed and he sees nothing 
beyond a few yards away, but his hearing and sense 
of smell are keen, and he sniffs danger from afar 
in case danger happens to be to windward of him. 
His sensitive nose is always alert for foreign and, 
therefore, suspicious odors, and when he smells the 
