THE RHINOCEROS. 157

day by this faithful but exasperating little the upper branches, which have most
guardian. Five different times did the leaves, and these he devours first; hav-
sportsman "spoor" or track his mighty ing stripped the tree of its branches, he
game, through boggy and tiring soil, and does not therefore abandon it, but placing
five times Buphaga, scenting his murder- his snout as low in the trunk as he knows
ous approach, screamed an alarm to its his horn or horns will enter, he rips up
animated pasturage, the oddly assorted the body of the tree, and reduces it to
pair at once making off-the bird a few thin pieces, as so many laths; when he
feet overhead, the beast through the has thus prepared it, he embraces as
dense underwood. As something near a much of it as he can in his monstrous
mile was the distance between the shift- jaws, and twists it round with as much
ing points, it can scarcely be wondered ease as an ox would do a root of celery.
that the hunter at last lost his temper, When pursued, the rhinoceros, not-
and letting off at poor Buphaga with a withstanding his large, cumbrous body,
full rhinoceros charge, blew it to atoms. can run with astonishing swiftness.
Bereft of its tiny protector, the big, blun- In a book called the Nile Tributa-
dering beast was laid low within half an ries of Abyssinia," there are several very
hour. Easy enough, however, is it to exciting accounts, and also pictures of
understand the hunter in question, when encounters with this animal.
he says, "I don't know how it came Two rhinoceroses were found asleep
about, but certainly I felt a pang after beneath a thick mass of bushes. They
destroying the little creature, such as in were lying like pigs, close together, so
my long experience I never felt before. that at a distance no exact form could be
Moreover, slaying the giant brute after- distinguished. They have a wonderful
wards, gave me no consolation." power of scent, that will detect a stranger
 The celebrated traveler, Bruce, says of at a distance of five or six hundred yards.
the rhinoceros, that, besides trees capa- Probably, by this power, though they
ble of most resistance, there are in the seemed to be enjoying happy dreams,
vast forests, trees of a softer consist- they were warned of the approach of an
ence, and of a very succulent quality, enemy, and suddenly sprang to their feet
which seem to be destined for the prin- with astounding quickness, and with a
cipal food of this animal. For the pur- loud and sharp whiff, whiff, whiff! one of
pose of gaining the highest branches them charged straight at the hunter.
of these, his upper lip is capable of be- He fired into the creature's throat, which
ing lengthened out, so as to increase turned him, and the two thundered off
his power of laying hold with this in together at a great pace, followed by four
the same manner as the elephant does hunters on the fleetest of horses, and
with his trunk; with this lip, and the after a race of two or three miles, they
assistance of his tongue, he pulls down escaped into a jungle, the rear-most re-