the RIVER-HORSE; a genus of quadrupeds belonging to the order of belluae, the characters of which are these: It has four fore-teeth in the upper jaw, disposed in pairs at a distance from each other; and four prominent fore-teeth in the under jaw, the intermediate ones being longest: There are two Hippopotamus tusks in each jaw, those of the under one very long and obliquely truncated; in both they stand solitary, and are recurved: The feet are hoofed on the edges.

There is but one known species, viz. the amphibius, or river-horse, (Plate CCXXXVI.) The head of this animal is of an enormous size, and the mouth vastly wide. The ears are small and pointed, and lined within very thickly with short fine hairs. The eyes and nostrils are small in proportion to the bulk of the animal. On the lips are some strong hairs scattered in patches here and there. The hair on the body is very thin, of a whitish colour, and scarce discernible at first sight. There is no mane on the neck, as some writers feign, only the hairs on that part are rather thicker. The skin is very thick and strong, and of a dullish colour. The tail is about a foot long, taper, compressed, and naked. The hoofs are divided into four parts. The legs are short and thick. In bulk it is second only to the elephant. The length of a male has been found to be 17 feet; the circumference of the body 15, the height near 7½, the legs near 3, the head above 3½, and the girth near 9. The mouth, when open, is above 2 feet wide; and furnished with 44 teeth of different figures (including the cutting teeth and the canine). The cutting, and particularly the canine teeth of the lower jaw, are very long, and so hard and strong that they strike fire with steel. This circumstance, it is probable, gave rise to the fable of the ancients, that the hippopotamus vomited fire from his mouth. The substance of the canine teeth is so white, so fine, and so hard, that it is preferable to ivory for making artificial teeth. The cutting teeth, especially those of the under jaw, are very long, cylindrical, and chamfered. The canine teeth are also long, crooked, prismatic, and sharp, like the tusks of the wild boar. The grinders are square or oblong, like those of man, and so large that a single tooth sometimes weighs three pounds. The tusks, according to Dr Sparman, are 27 inches long.—With such powerful arms, and such a prodigious strength of body, the hippopotamus might render himself formidable to every other animal. But he is naturally of a mild disposition, and is only formidable when provoked. His bulk is so great, that twelve oxen have been found necessary to draw one ashore which had been shot in a river above the Cape; and Hasselquist says, its hide is a load for a camel. Tho' he delights in the water, and lives in it as freely as upon land; yet he has not, like the beaver or otter, membranes between his toes. The great size of his belly renders his specific gravity nearly equal to that of water, and makes him swim with ease.

These animals inhabit the rivers of Africa, from the Niger to Berg River, many miles north of the Cape of Good Hope. They formerly abounded in the rivers nearer the Cape, but are now almost extirpated; and to preserve the few which are left in Berg River, the governor has absolutely prohibited the shooting them without particular permission.—They are not found in any of the African rivers which run into the Mediterranean except the Nile, and even there only in Upper Egypt, and in the fens and lakes of Ethiopia which that river passes through. From the unwieldiness of his body and the shortness of his legs, the hippopotamus... The hippopotamus was known to the Romans; Hippopotamus Scaurus treated the people with the sight of five crocodiles and one hippopotamus during his archbishopric, and exhibited them in a temporary lake. Augustus produced one at his triumph over Cleopatra.

This animal is the behemoth of Job; who admirably describes its manners, food, and haunts. "1. Behold now behemoth, which I made near thee: he eateth grass as an ox. 2. Lo! now his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. 3. His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron. 4. He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of the reed and fens. 5. Behold! he drinketh up a river: he truetheth he can draw up Jordan into his mouth." The first, the learned Bochart observes, implies the locality of its situation; being an inhabitant of the Nile, in the neighbourhood of Uz, the land of Job. The second describes its great strength; and the third, the peculiar hardness of its bones. The fourth indicates its residence amidst the vast reeds of the river of Egypt, and other African rivers overshadowed with thick forests. The fifth, the characteristic wideness of its mouth; which is hyperbolically described as large enough to exhaust such a stream as Jordan.

That this article may include every sort of information which could be collected concerning a creature so highly noted and of such ancient fame, we shall add the following particulars, extracted from Sparman's Voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, where these animals are called sea-cows.

"Towards evening (Jan. 24, 1776), we came to a pit in the river, which our guides knew used to be frequented by sea-cows. For this reason, all the different ways by which these animals might come up from the river, were beset by us separately; our hunting-party consisting in the whole of seven persons, viz., five of us Christians, together with my Hottentot and another belonging to the farmers. Besides this, the rest of the Hottentots were ordered to go to the windward and to the more open places; and by smacking their whips, and making other noises, to frighten and drive the animal towards us as soon as it should make its appearance: in consequence of which measures, it appeared to us, that when at length obliged to go on shore in quest of its food, it must necessarily come to the hiding-place of some one of the hunters. Every one of these places were just at the edge of the river, between the reeds which grew on the dry parts of the river, or on those spots which the water had left, and at the same time close to the very narrow paths which the animal had made for itself at each place: in consequence of which disposition, it would inevitably pass not above six inches, or a foot at most, from the mouth of the sportsman's piece. Consequently our whole dependence was upon two circumstances; viz., that our guns should not miss fire, and that the shot should not fail to prove mortal. In the former case, the sportsman must have inevitably paid for his temerity with his life; though in the latter he had reason to hope, from instances of what had happened to others, that the fire, together with the report from the piece, as well as the ball itself, would confuse the animal, so as to prevent it from immediately making towards its enemy. The banks of the pit which we then beset..." were in most places steep and perpendicular, and the pit itself was almost three quarters of a mile long; but my post and that of my fellow-traveller (Mr Immelman) happened to be at the distance of not above 30 or 40 paces from each other. To these very places too, after we had waited at them an hour and an half in the most profound silence, the enormous animals did not fail to resort. They had already, while on the other side of the river, got scent of the Hottentots; and now showed by their swimming up and down and blowing themselves, as well as by a short but acute and piercing grunt or neighing noise, that they had a great suspicion of these pastes. I believe Mr Immelman was not less eager and anxious than myself, each of us expecting every moment to have a bout with a huge enormous beast which we knew had given certain proofs of its being able to bite a man afunder. Yet were we each of us at times no less fearful lest the other should have the honour of killing game of such consequence. The hippopotamus, however, left us, and had made its appearance in the same manner where the farmers were stationed; notwithstanding which, at that very instant we heard it shot at by one of the Hottentots.—The fable darkness of the night, and the glittering of the Hottentot’s piece, together with the loudness of the report from it, occasioned by the weight of the charge, and the vibrations of the echo prolonging the sound along the neighbouring chain of mountains, all conspired to compose a most awful and superb spectacle, which was still heightened by the expectation of seeing an animal fall superior in bulk to the elephant. This sublime spectacle was immediately followed by a ridiculous kind of farce performed by a troop of baboons; which, from their calling and answering each other along a straight line, we could discover to be encamped on a steep rocky mountain in the neighbourhood, with regular out-posts in the trees on each side of it. After an interval of a couple of minutes, silence again took place, till two o’clock, when the other Hottentot fired his piece; and another alarm, though of shorter duration, went through the baboons out-posts and head-quarters.

“The next morning, for the arrival of which we ardently longed, in order to satisfy our curiosity, our Hottentot sportsmen related to us the following particulars concerning the adventures of the night. Involved in darkness, covered up to the eyes in reeds, and overshadowed with branches of trees, they could only get a glimpse of the animal, and consequently could not answer for their shots having taken place: and one of them acknowledged, that he was a little confused, as he could not well see what he was about; and for the same reason fired his piece too soon, before the animal had well risen out of the water. The other indeed had had an opportunity, both with the ball and shot that made up the charge, of wounding the animal, which went on its road, and passed directly by him; but he could not see which part of the animal presented itself before the muzzle of his piece. As soon as he had fired, he flanked away, and directly afterwards heard the beast take to the water. The rest of the Hottentots had observed one of these animals, probably a different one from this, run up on a shallow along the river side, and thus make its escape, without their having been able to prevent it. After this we stood here till the afternoon, in hopes that the wounded animals would die and rise to Hippopotamus at the top of the water. But we stood in vain; and to as little purpose would it probably have been had we waited still longer, as there grew by the side of the river a great number of trees, to the roots of which these creatures, it is said, in the agonies of death, make themselves fast by means of their long and crooked tails. On the other hand, supposing these two sea-cows to be but slightly wounded, they would be cautious how they made their appearance; and indeed, in all probability, it would have been a dangerous service to the sportmen who should have ventured to have followed them any farther. Besides, the water had now, in the space of a few hours, risen considerably, and had overflowed many spots fit for lying in ambush; for which reason we departed to another hippopotamus pit less than this. Here too we laid, by way of snare, a large blunderbuss. The Hottentots occupied one post; two of our company guarded another; other two (an old farmer and his son) stationed themselves at the third, and placed me in the middle of them. Just in this part the banks of the river were of a considerable height, and the river itself was dried up near an extensive shallow, where it was spread out into a little plain covered with pebble-stones and gravel. We three then set ourselves down close by the side of each other, in a path made by the sea-cows, making ourselves pretty certain, as the place was flat, and consequently it was light here, of being able, if any hippopotamus should chance to come upon the shallow and look about it, to see it plain enough to kill it with a volley of three shot. But, to the great endangering of our lives, we on a sudden found the animal much quicker in its motions, as well as bolder, than we had thought it: for while I was sitting half asleep, and moralizing on the subject, struck with the consideration that we with our guns had at that present moment the dominion over Job’s leviathan or behemoth; while, on the other hand, the flies or small musquitoes had the dominion over us (so much, indeed, that I was obliged to wrap my face up in a handkerchief), a sea-cow came rushing upon us out of the river, with a hideous cry, as swift as an arrow out of a bow; at the same time I heard the farmer call out, “Heer Jefus!” But fortunately at the very instant he discharged his piece, which flashing full in the animal’s face contributed perhaps more than the ball to make it start back; when setting up another cry, it threw itself into the water again with as great precipitation as it came out.

“At this I was not a little alarmed; yet, what is very fingular, not at the danger, which was real, of being trampled under foot, or being bitten afunder by the beast, but in consequence of my apprehensions, which were merely imaginary, of being drowned: for the rattling noise, arising from the creature’s running out of the water and along the stoney beech, immediately suggested to me the idea that the river had on a sudden overflowed its banks; a supposition to which I was the more inclined, as I knew that this accident happens very frequently here. And as the hippopotamus, when it is newly come up out of the water, and is wet and slimy, is said to glister in the moon-shine like a fish, it is no wonder that as soon as I took my handkerchief from before my eyes, it should appear to me, at so near a view as I had of it, like a high column of water, which seemed to threaten to carry us off and drown us in a moment; for which reason I ran, or rather flew, towards the higher ground, leaving both my guns and my brother sentinels behind me. But as just at this spot I was prevented by the steepness of the river's banks from ascending the heights, and nevertheless perceived that neither my companions nor myself were drowned, it ran in my head, for the space of several seconds, that we were all of us either dreaming or delirious. The farmer's son had fallen asleep, and still continued to sleep very soundly. As to the farmer himself, who, panting and breathless, every now and then looked up to heaven, and at the same time, with much awkwardness and bustle, was endeavouring to make his escape, I made all the haste I could to disengage him from a large wrapper, which, as well on account of his gout as by way of keeping off the flies, he had wrapped round his legs. I then asked him what course the water had taken when it overflowed? and he, after a long pause, answered only by asking me in his turn if I was not mad? upon which I was almost ready to put the same question to myself. And even at last, when all this was unriddled to me, I could not help doubting of the truth of it, till I found the farmer's gun was really discharged; for the rattling among the stones and the squashing in the water, occasioned by the sea-cow, was what I first heard, and what made me take to my legs; so that I did not attend in the least either to the report of the gun or the cry of the animal, though these latter appeared to the rest of our party the most terrible: so much, indeed, that they occasioned Mr Immelman, together with the farmer's son-in-law, to fly from their post; though they had seen nothing of all that had happened, and could not easily have come to any harm.—We concluded the chase; and spent the remainder of the night in laughing at each other, in chattering, and forming various conjectures on the subject of the precipitation and impetuous fury of the sea-cow; which, however, was probably as much alarmed and frightened as we ourselves could possibly be: we even smoked a couple of pipes while we listened to the roaring of the lion, and waited for the approach of the morning. Several Hottentots then told us, that soon after the noise and tumult we have been describing had ceased, they had seen a sea-cow making its way out of the river towards that side of it which was unguarded.

"On the 25th, from some traces of the sea-cows which we found in the dust near another spot, we concluded that many of these huge amphibious animals had lately taken up their quarters in a certain pit thereabouts; which we accordingly prepared to lay siege to in every possible way. In the mean time, we saw a young lion make its escape into a close thicket on the side of this same pit, where it might be perfectly safe from us and our hounds. Not much approving of this animal's being so near a neighbour to us, we thought it best for several of us marksmen to be together at each hiding-place; at the same time ordering our Hottentots, partly by making a noise and uproar, and partly by the means of making large fires, to frighten the sea-cows from attempting any of the other passes. These animals had probably been beset in the same manner several times before, as this night we scarcely heard anything of them. In the meantime, however, we flattered ourselves, that by continuing to block them up, we should at least by starving them force them to quit their asylum, and expose themselves on the land to the fire of our guns.

"On the 26th likewise we were on the look-out after these animals, between the hours of ten and eleven in the forenoon, and also just before dark, though upon a quite different plan from what we had before, as we meant now to hit them on their fronts the instant they should stick them up within the reach of our guns out of the water in order to take breath, or more properly (as it is not unaptly called by the colonists) to blow themselves. In order that the shot might prove mortal, we were obliged, however, on this occasion, to direct it in such a manner, that the ball should pass through the cavity of the nose into the brain. It was merely upon this plan that we went out after the sea-cows before we arrived at Agter Bruntjesboogte, and were strengthened by the farmer's party. But we constantly found these animals too shy to allow us to put our designs in execution; for although, in those places where they had not been frightened or wounded, they will often in the middle of the day raise their heads and part of their bodies above the surface of the water, they at this time scarcely ventured just to put one of their nostrils only out of it, in order to breathe almost imperceptibly; and this only for the most part in those spots in which they were sheltered from us by the hanging branches of trees. Notwithstanding this disadvantageous situation, they, in consequence of the acuteness of their smell, seemed still to discern us, especially when we were to the windward of them; as in that case they instantly withdrew to another part.

"The same night we betook ourselves again to our posts; and at half an hour after eight, it being already very dark, a sea-cow began at intervals to put its head up above the water, and utter a sharp, piercing, and, as it were, a very angry cry, which seemed to be between grunting and neighing. Perhaps this cry may be best expressed by the words húrrk húrrk, hub-hub; the two first being uttered slowly, in a hoarse but sharp and tremulous sound, resembling the grunting of other animals; while the third, or compound word, is sounded extremely quick, and is not unlike the neighing of a horse. It is true, it is impossible to express these inarticulate sounds in writing; but perhaps one may make nearer approaches to it than one can to the gutturopalatial sounds of the Hottentot language. At eleven o'clock came the same or else some other hippopotamus, and in like manner visited the posts we occupied. He did not, however, dare to come up, though to our extreme mortification we heard him come and nibble the boughs which hung over the surface of the water, as well as a little grass and a few low shrubs which grew here and there on the inside of the river's banks. We were, however, in hopes that this way of living would not long suffice animals, one of which only required almost a larger portion than a whole team of oxen. Thus far at least is certain, that if one should calculate the consumption of provisions made by a sea-cow from the size of its stomach, and from that of its body and of its belly, which hangs almost down to the ground, together with the quantity of grass... grafs which I have at different times observed to have been consumed by one of these animals in spots whither it has come over night to graze, the amount would appear almost incredible.

"We passed the following night at the same pofts as we occupied on the night preceding, the fea-cows acting much in the same manner as before. On the 28th, after fun-rise, just as we were thinking of going from our pofts home to our waggons, there comes a female hippopotamus with her calf, from some other pit or river, to take up her quarters in that which we were then blockading. While she was waiting at a rather steep part of the river's banks, and looking back after her calf, which was lame, and consequently came on but slowly, she received a shot in her side, upon which she directly plunged into the river; but was not mortally wounded; for Flip (the farmer's son), the drowndest of all sublunary beings, who had shot her, and that instant could hardly be awakened by two Hottentots, was still half asleep when he fired his piece. And happy was it for him that the enormous beast did not make towards his hiding or rather sleeping place, and send him into the other world to sleep for ever. In the mean while his shot was so far off service, that one of my Hottentots ventured to seize the calf, and hold it fast by its hind-legs till the rest of the hunting party came to his affluence. Upon which the calf was fast bound, and with the greatest joy borne in triumph to our waggons; though while they were taking it over a shallow near the river, the Hottentots were very much alarmed lest the wounded mother and the other fea-cows should be induced by the cries of the calf to come to its relief; the creature, as long as it was bound, making a noise a good deal like a hog that is going to be killed, or has got fast between two pofts. The found, however, proceeding from the hippopotamus calf was more shrill and harsh. It showed likewise a considerable share of strength in the attempt it made to get loose, and was found to be quite unmanageable and unwieldy: the length of it being already three feet and a half, and the height two feet; though the Hottentots supposed it to be no more than a fortnight, or at most three weeks, old. When at last it was turned loose, it ceased crying; and when the Hottentots had patted their hands several times over its nose, in order to accustom it to their effluvia, began directly to take to them.

"While the calf was yet alive, I made a drawing of it, a copy of which may be seen in the Swedish Transactions for 1778. After this it was killed, dissected, and eaten up in less than three hours time. The reason of this quick dispatch was partly the warmth of the weather, and partly our being in absolute want of any other fresh provisions. We found the flesh and fat of this calf as flabby as one might have expected from its want of age, and consequently not near so good as that of the old fea-cows; of which I found the flesh tender, and the fat of a taste like marrow, or at least not so greasy and strong as other fat. It is for this reason likewise that the colonists look upon the flesh and fat of the fea cow as the wholesomest meat that can be eaten; the gelatinous part of the feet in particular, when properly dressed, being accounted a great delicacy. The dried tongues of these animals are also considered even at the Cape as a rare and savory dish. Hippopotamus. On my return to Sweden, I had the honour to furnish his majesty's table with a dried fea-cow's tongue, two feet and eight inches long. With respect to form, the tongue of a full-grown hippopotamus is very blunt at the tip, and is in fact broadest at that part; if at the same time it is slanted off towards one side, and marked with lobes, as I was informed it is, this circumstance may, perhaps, proceed from the friction it suffers against the teeth, towards the side on which the animal chiefly chews; at least some traces of this oblique form were discoverable on the dried tongue I am speaking of.

"The hide of the adult hippopotamus bears a great resemblance to that of the rhinoceros, but is rather thicker. Whips likewise made of this hide are stronger, and after being used some time, are more pliable than those made of the hide of the rhinoceros usually are, though they are not so transparent as these latter are when new.

"The food of the hippopotamus consists entirely of herbs and grubs, a circumstance of which we are informed by Father Lobo; and which may partly be inferred from what I have already said on the subject, as well as from the figure of the stomach belonging to the fetus of a hippopotamus given in Meffra de Buffon and Daubenton's elegant work. I therefore do not look upon it as very probable, that these animals, agreeably to the assertions of M. de Buffon, p. 93. or of Dampier in his voyage, should hunt after fish by way of preying upon them; especially as in some of the rivers of the southern part of Africa, where the fea-cows are seen daily and in great abundance, there is not a fish to be seen; and in others only a few bastard springers, as they are called (cyprinus gonorynchus), which are scarcely as big as a common herring. It is said, that a small species of carp is still more rarely to be met with here. It is true, that the fea-cows sometimes frequent the mouths of the rivers here, which are full of sea-fish, and even sometimes the sea itself: we know, however, that these huge quadrupeds are notwithstanding this obliged to go from thence upon dry-land in quest of food. Neither is it probable that they can drink the sea-water; as an instance was related to me of the contrary in a hippopotamus, which, having been disturbed in the rivers, had taken refuge in the sea, and yet was obliged to go ashore every night and drink fresh water from a well in the neighbourhood, till at last it was shot by some people that lay in wait for it there. That the hippopotamuses actually lived in salt-water, I have seen evident proofs at the mouths both of Kromme and Camtou rivers, particularly in the latter, on my journey homewards; where many of these animals blew themselves in broad-day-light, and thrust their heads up above the water; and one of them in particular, which had been wounded by an ill directed shot on the nose, neighed from anger and resentment. In Krakekanama I saw on the beach manifest traces of a hippopotamus which had come out of the sea, but had retired thither again directly. That very attentive navigator Captain Burtz informed me, that he had frequently seen on the eastern coast of Africa fea-horses (meaning probably the hippopotamus) raise their heads above the surface of the water, in order to blow themselves and neigh. I have Hippopotamus have been induced to be rather circumstantial on this subject, as M. Adanson had taken into his head, in his Voyage au Sénégal, to limit the abode of the hippopotamus to the fresh water rivers only in Africa; and M. de Buffon has taken upon him to support this opinion, and to render Kolbe's testimony to the contrary liable to suspicion.

An old experienced huntsman told me, that he had once seen two hippopotamuses copulate, which they did in the same manner as common cattle. On this occasion the beasts stood in a shallow part of the river, where the water reached up to their knees.

The method of catching the hippopotamus consists (besides shooting it) in making pits for it in those parts which the animal passes in his way to and from the river; but this method is peculiar to the Hottentots; and is only practised by them in the rainy season, as the ground in summer is too hard for that purpose. It is said that they have never succeeded in killing this huge aquatic animal with poisoned darts, though this way of killing game is practised with advantage by the Hottentots for the destruction both of the elephant and rhinoceros. The colonists likewise were not entirely unacquainted with the method mentioned by M. Haffelquist, as being common in Egypt, viz. to strew on the ground as many peas or beans as the animal can possibly eat, by which means it bursts its belly and dies. But as this method is very expensive, and they can generally have this animal for a single charge of powder and a tin ball, shot in a proper direction, they chiefly and almost solely have recourse to this cheaper expedient.

The hippopotamus is not so quick in its pace on land as the generality of the larger quadrupeds, though perhaps it is not so slow and heavy as M. de Buffon describes it to be; for both the Hottentots and colonists look upon it as dangerous to meet a hippopotamus out of the water, especially as, according to report, they had had a recent instance of one of these animals, which, from certain circumstances, was supposed to be in rut, having for several hours pursued a Hottentot, who found it very difficult to make his escape. The people of this country did not entertain that opinion of the medicinal virtues of the hippopotamus, as they did of certain parts of the elephant and rhinoceros; excepting one colonist, who imagined he had found the aspetrosum of this animal reduced to powder, and taken in the quantity that would lie on the point of a knife, excellent in convulsions, and particularly in the convulsions (fluyens) of children. That the flesh is reckoned very wholesome food, I have already mentioned.

Having already exceeded the limits I had prescribed to myself, I do not intend to dwell here on the anatomy of the hippopotamus we caught, particularly as the internal conformation of the calves is somewhat different from that of the adult animal. I shall therefore only briefly mention the following particulars: the stomachs were four in number, and consequently one more than in the fetus examined by M. Daubenton, which was kept in spirits. Compare Buffon, Tom. xii. Tab. iv. fig. 2. The two first stomachs were each of them about seven inches long and three inches in diameter; the third was nine inches in length, and a little wider than the two former; the fourth was seven inches long, and at the upper part five inches broad, but decreased by degrees on one side till it terminated in the pylorus, which had an aperture an inch in width, being about half as wide again as the cardia. I did not observe any such valves as M. Daubenton has delineated. The first stomach we found mostly empty, it containing only a few lumps of cheese or curd; it likewise differed from the rest by the superior fineness of its internal coat. The internal membrane of the second stomach was rather coarser, and had many small holes in it; it likewise contained several clods of calcous matter, together with a great quantity of sand and mud. The third stomach had very visible folds, both longitudinal and transversal, on the inside of it, and contained calcous lumps of a yellow colour and harder consistence than the others, together with several leaves quite whole and fresh, and at the same time some dirt. The interior membrane of the fourth stomach was very smooth, though it was not without folds; in the stomach itself there was a good deal of dirt, with a small quantity of curds, which were whiter than they were in any of the other stomachs. This fourth stomach in a great measure covered the rest, being situated on the right side of the animal, and was found to have the upper part of the melt adhering to its superior and inferior edge. This latter vesicula, which was one foot long and three inches broad, diverged from it downwards on the left side. The intestinal canal was 109 feet long; the liver measured 14 inches from right to left, and 7 or 8 from the hind part to the fore part. On its anterior edges it had a large notch, being in other respects undivided and entire; it was of an oblique form, being broadest towards the left side, where I discovered a gall-bladder five inches in length. In the uterus there was nothing particularly worthy of observation. I found two teats, and the heart surrounded with much fat; the length of this muscle was five inches, and the breadth about four inches and a half. The communication between the auricles, called the foramen ovale, was above an inch in diameter. Each lung was eleven inches long and undivided; but at the superior and exterior part of the right lung there were two globules or processes elevated half an inch above the surface; and on the side corresponding to it, in the left lung, and in the upper part of it, there was a little excrescence, terminating in a point; somewhat below this, yet more forwards, there was found likewise a process half an inch in height. Directly over the lower part of the communication formed between the right and left lung, there was a kind of crest or comb, measuring an inch from the top to the basis.

One of my brother sportsmen said, he had once observed a peculiar kind of vermin on the body of one of these amphibious animals; but on the calf we had caught we found nothing but a species of leech, which kept only about the anus, and likewise a good way up in the strait gut, where, by a timely abstraction of the blood, they may be of use to these large amphibious animals; and particularly may act as preservatives against the piles, repaying themselves for their trouble in kind. Most of them were very small; but on the other hand there was a considerable number of them. The only large one I saw of this species, being some- HIPPODONTA—what more than an inch in length, I described and made a drawing of: this is inserted by the name of the Hirudo Capensis, corpore fulvo nigricante, medio longitudinaliter sub-brunneo, fultus pallide fusco, in the elegant Treatise on Worms, which M. Adolphus Nodeer, first secretary of the patriotic society, is preparing for the press. Instead of the lighter coloured streak upon the back, there was discoverable in some of these leeches one and sometimes two longitudinal brownish lines, which grew fainter and fainter towards the extremities.

"The huge animal of which we have been speaking, has doubtless obtained its present name of hippopotamus, which signifies river-horse, merely in consequence of the neighing sound it makes; as otherwise in its form it bears not the least resemblance to a horse, but rather to a hog. Neither does it in the least resemble the ox; so it could be only the different stomachs of this animal which could occasion it to be called sea-cow at the Cape; and perhaps it is for the same reason that the Hottentots call it the 'kau,' which nearly approaches to 'kau,' the name by which the buffalo is known among these people.

"From the account given by Bellonius of a tame hippopotamus, which he describes as a beast of a very mild and gentle nature, as well as from the disposition of the calf we had just caught, it follows, that this animal might be easily brought over to Europe, where it has been formerly exhibited at two different times in the public spectacles at Rome. For this purpose, the capture might easily be made at Konaps-river, where these animals, according to the accounts given me by the Caffres, reside in great abundance; and milch cows might be kept ready at hand, in order to rear the calf in case it was a suckling. Indeed I am apt to suppose, that one a little older than this would not be very nice in its food; as that which we caught was induced by hunger, as soon as it was let loose near the waggon, to put up with something not extremely delicate, which had been just dropped from one of our oxen. This perhaps may appear very extraordinary in an animal with four stomachs; but there have been instances of this kind known in common cattle, which in Herjedal are partly fed with horse-dung." (Vid. Hulphers's Beskrifning om Norrland, p. 27-87.) I have been likewise assured, that this method of feeding cattle has been practised with great advantage in Uplandia, when there has been a scarcity of fodder; and that afterwards these same cattle, even when they have not been in want of proper fodder, have taken to this food of their own accord, and eaten it without anything else being mixed with it."