of the World182 The Living Animals

THE RHINOCEROS.

BY F. C. SELOUS.

OF the five existing species of RHINO- CEROS, three are found in Asia, whilst two are inhabitants of Africa. Of the three Asiatic species, two, the INDIAN and the JAVAN, are one-horned, and have a single pair of broad incisor teeth in the upper jaw, and a pair of sharp-edged and pointed tusks in the lower, the nasal bones being long and narrow, and terminating in a point. In both these species the skin is hairless (except for tufts or fringes at the extremity of the tail and on the edges of the ears), and is arranged in shield-like folds over the body. The arrangement of these folds, however, differs somewhat in the two species, and the large round tubercles with which the skin of the great Indian rhinoceros studded are is profusely in the Javan t.^- _,; species. - -, --*- / - ^ wanting

Photo by JT. P. Dando] [Regent's Park. The INDIAN EHINOCEROS inhabits the

HAIRY-EARED SUMATRAN RHINOCEROS.

Terai at the foot of the Himalaya from This species is found in Eastern Bengal and in the Malay Peninsula and adjacent large islands. Bhutan to Nepal, and is said to be very abundant in Assam and the Bhutan Dooars. It frequents swampy ground, and lives amongst jungles and dense growths of reeds and grass, which attain a height sometimes of 20 feet, and cover vast areas of ground in the valley of the Brahmaputra and other rivers.

Owing to the nature of the country in which it lives, the Indian rhinoceros cannot often be hunted with much prospect of success, except with the aid of elephants, which sagacious animals are not only employed to carry the hunters, but are also used to beat the great grass jungles in which the rhinoceroses lie hidden, and drive them towards the guns.

Despite its great size and strength, the Indian rhinoceros seems to be regarded as, in general, a timid and inoffensive animal, and even when wounded it seldom charges home. Elephants, however, appear to be as a rule nervous when in the near proximity of rhinoceroses, perhaps objecting to the smell of those animals. When the Indian rhinoceros does make good its teeth, andits charge against either man or elephant, it cuts and rips its enemy with makes little use of its horn as an offensive weapon.

The Indian rhinoceros is said to live principally, if not entirely, on grass and reeds. As a rule it is a solitary animal, but sometimes several are found living in a comparatively small extent of grass-covered plain.

Large males of this species will stand from 5 feet 9 inches to 6 feet at the shoulder, and they are enormously bulky. Both sexes carry well-developed horns, which, however, do not usually attain a length of upwards of 12 inches. There is a specimen in the British Museum measuring 19 inches, and it is believed that in very exceptional instances a length of 2 feet has been attained. The JAVAN RHINOCEROS, though it has been called the Lesser Indian Rhinoceros, is said by a late authority Mr. C. E. M. Russell to stand about the same height at the shoulder as the Indian species. It is found in the Sunderbunds of Eastern Bengal, and has been met with in the Sikhim Terai and in Assam, ranging eastwards through Burma and the Malay Peninsula to Sumatra, Java, and Borneo.

Photo by J. W. McLellan] [Highbury.

GREAT INDIAN RHINOCEROS.

The largest land mammal of the East after the elephant.

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But little appears to be known of the habits of this species of rhinoceros. Although it is found in the swampy grass-covered plains of the Sunderbunds, its more usual habitat seems to be hilly forest-covered country, and both in Burma and Java it ascends to a height of several thousand feet above sea-level. It feeds principally upon leaves and the young shoots of trees and bushes. In disposition it is timid and inoffensive. Only the male carries a horn, which, being very short, is a very poor trophy for a sportsman.

The third Asiatic species of rhinoceros, known as the SUMATRAN, is the smallest of all living rhinoceroses. This species carries two horns, and its skin, which is very rough, is usually thinly covered with hair of a dark brown colour and of considerable length. The folds in the skin of the Sumatran rhinoceros are not nearly so well developed as in its single-horned relatives, and the one behind the shoulders is alone continued over the back. Although furnished with tusks in the lower jaw, the small pair of incisor teeth, which in the other two Asiatic rhinoceroses are always present in front of these tusks, are wanting in the Sumatran species.

The Sumatran rhinoceros is rare in Assam, but is found in Burma and the Malay Peninsula, as well as in Siam, Sumatra, and Borneo. The two horns of this species are placed at some distance apart. Although they are as a rule very short, the front horn occasionally grows to a considerable length, sweeping backwards in a graceful curve.

In height adult males of the Sumatran species stand on the average from 4 feet to 4½ feet at the shoulder, and females sometimes not more than 3 feet 8 inches.

Like the Javan rhinoceros, the Sumatran species is by preference an inhabitant of hilly, forest-covered country, and browses on the leaves and shoots of trees and bushes. It is a timid and inoffensive animal, soon becoming tame in captivity. Its flesh is said to be much appreciated by the Dyaks of Borneo; and as its horns are of value for export to China, where they are used for medicinal purposes, it has of late years very much decreased in numbers in the province of Sarawak, but is more plentiful in Central and North Borneo. Living as it does in dense jungle, it is an animal which is seldom seen by European sportsmen, and its habits in a wild state have never been yet very closely studied.

Turning to the two species of rhinoceros which inhabit the continent of Africa, both are double-horned, and neither furnished with incisor teeth, the nasal bones being thick, rounded, and truncated in front. Both, too, are smooth-skinned and entirely hairless, except on the edge of the ears and extremity of the tail, which are fringed or tufted.

Of the two African species, the WHITE or SQUARE-MOUTHED RHINOCEROS is the larger and the rarer. Until quite recently the range of this huge ungainly-looking animal, the biggest of all terrestrial mammals after the elephant, was supposed to be entirely confined to the southern portions of the African Continent; for although from time to time horns had found their way to Zanzibar which seemed referable to the square-mouthed rhinoceros, the fact of the existence of the white rhinoceros in any part of Africa north of the Zambesi remained in doubt until a female was shot in the year 1900, in the neighbourhood of Lado, on the Upper Nile, by Captain A. St. H. Gibbons, who brought its skin, skull, and horns to England.

Photo by York & Son] [Notting Hill.

GREAT INDIAN RHINOCEROS.

This species inhabits the grass jungles of North-eastern India.

The Elephant, Tapir, Hyrax, and Rhinoceros 185

PAoto 6y 6'. 5. Ilausbury, E#I. BLACK AFRICAN RHINOCEROSES.

A splendid snapshot of two black African rhinoceroses taken on the open veldt. They were afterwards shot by the party.

The fact, however, that the white rhinoceros has never been encountered by any other traveller in Central Africa seems to show that the animal is either very rare in those districts, or that it has an exceedingly limited range.

In the early years of the nineteenth century the square-mouthed or white rhinoceros was found in large numbers over the whole of South Africa from the Orange River to the Zambesi, except in the waterless portions of the Kalahari Desert, or those parts of the country which are covered with rugged stony hills or dense jungle.

Speaking of his journey in 1837 through the western part of what is now the Transvaal Colony, Captain (afterwards Sir) Cornwallis Harris wrote: " On our way from the waggons to a hill not half a mile distant, we counted no less than twenty-two of the white species of rhinoceros, and were compelled in self-defence to slaughter four. On one occasion I was besieged in a bush by three at once, and had no little difficulty in beating off the assailants." Even so lately as thirty years ago the white rhinoceros was still to be met with in fair numbers in Ovampoland and other districts of Western South Africa, whilst it was quite plentiful in all the uninhabited parts of Eastern South Africa from Zululand to the Zambesi. In 1872 and 1873, whilst elephant-hunting in the uninhabited parts of Matabililand, I encountered white rhinoceroses almost daily, and often saw several in one day. At the present time, however, unless it should prove to be numerous in some as yet unexplored districts of North Central Africa, this strange and interesting animal must be counted one of the rarest of existing mammals, and in Southern Africa I fear it must soon become extinct. A few still exist amongst the wild loquat groves of Northern Mashona- Photo by C. S. Hamburg, Esq. land, and there are also a few surviving in ONE OF THE SAME RHINOCEROSES DEAD. Zululand; but I fear that even with the This picture gives some idea of the size of the commonest surviving species.

of the Worldi86 The Living Animals

most rigid protection they are too few in number to restock the country. They have a better chance, I think, of increasing in numbers in Zululand than in Mashonaland, in which latter country it is at present impossible to afford them any protection either from natives or Europeans. A full-grown bull white rhinoceros stands from 6 feet G inches to 6 feet 9 inches at the shoulder, and is very massively built, with short, stout legs. The head is very much elongated, and the mouth square, like that of an ox. When white rhinoceroses

Photo by J. W. McLtllan] were still plentiful, very considerable RHINOCEROS BATHING. differences were observable in the

All the Asiatic species of rhinoceros are fond of bathing and wallowing in mud. length and shape of their horns. The anterior horns of full-grown bulls might measure from 18 inches to 40 inches in length; those of cows from 24 inches to 60 inches. The longest horn known that of a cow which was brought from South Africa by the well-known hunter the late Koualeyn Gordon Gumming, measures 62| inches over the curve. As a rule, the front horn of the white rhinoceros curved slightly backwards, but was often straight or bent slightly forwards, and sometimes curved strongly backwards. The posterior horn varied from a few inches to 2 feet in length.

The white rhinoceros lived in families, usually a bull, cow, and calf being found together; but there might be two or even three calves of different ages, and of which the youngest alone would be suckling, living with the father and mother. In the early South African spring rains,(September and October), when the young green herbage was just sprouting after the first two or three families of white rhinoceroses might be seen feeding in close proximity, presenting the appearance of a herd; but I fancy the several families of these animals had only been brought together for the sake of the young green grass. In Southern Africa the white rhinoceros lived entirely on grass, and I have never seen any evidence of their having eaten either walking, trotting, or galloping, the white rhinoceros alwaysanything else. When its mother, and she appeared to carried its nose close to the ground. A calf always preceded guide it by holding the point of her horn on the little creature's rump; and in all changes of pace, no matter how sudden, this position was always maintained. The white rhinoceros was easily killed by a shot through the heart or through both lungs, but would travel very long distances, and probably, as a rule, ultimately recover from wounds in other parts of the body. They could travel at a great rate and for a considerable distance with a broken fore leg or shoulder, but if a hind leg were broken they were rendered almost immediately helpless. In disposition they were sluggish and inoffensive animals, lying asleep in the shade of trees or bushes during the heat of the day, and coming to the water to drink at night or often before sundown in parts of the country where they had not been much molested. When disturbed, white rhinoceroses would go off at a swift trot, but if chased on horseback would break into a gallop, which they were capable of maintaining for a considerable distance, and at a wonderful pace for so large and heavy an animal. The meat of the white rhinoceros was most excellent, the part in greatest favour amongst hunters being the hump on the back of the neck in front of the shoulder, which was cut off whole and roasted in the skin in a hole dug in the ground.

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