My Friend Was Insensible For Some Time,
And, On Recovering, Found Large Wounds On The Thigh And Body:
I Saw
That on the former part still open, and five inches long.
The white, however, is not always quite safe, for
One,
even after it was mortally wounded, attacked Mr. Oswell's horse,
and thrust the horn through to the saddle, tossing at the time
both horse and rider. I once saw a white rhinoceros give a buffalo,
which was gazing intently at myself, a poke in the chest,
but it did not wound it, and seemed only a hint to get out of the way.
Four varieties of the rhinoceros are enumerated by naturalists,
but my observation led me to conclude that there are but two,
and that the extra species have been formed from differences
in their sizes, ages, and the direction of the horns,
as if we should reckon the short-horned cattle a different species
from the Alderneys or the Highland breed. I was led to this
from having once seen a black rhinoceros with a horn bent downward like
that of the kuabaoba, and also because the animals of the two great varieties
differ very much in appearance at different stages of their growth.
I find, however, that Dr. Smith, the best judge in these matters,
is quite decided as to the propriety of the subdivision
into three or four species. For common readers, it is sufficient to remember
that there are two well-defined species, that differ entirely
in appearance and food. The absence of both these rhinoceroses
among the reticulated rivers in the central valley may easily
be accounted for, they would be such an easy prey to the natives
in their canoes at the periods of inundation; but one can not so readily
account for the total absence of the giraffe and ostrich
on the high open lands of the Batoka, north of the Zambesi,
unless we give credence to the native report which bounds the country
still farther north by another network of waters near Lake Shuia,
and suppose that it also prevented their progress southward.
The Batoka have no name for the giraffe or the ostrich in their language;
yet, as the former exists in considerable numbers in the angle formed
by the Leeambye and Chobe, they may have come from the north
along the western ridge. The Chobe would seem to have been too narrow to act
as an obstacle to the giraffe, supposing it to have come into that district
from the south; but the broad river into which that stream flows
seems always to have presented an impassable barrier to both
the giraffe and the ostrich, though they abound on its southern border,
both in the Kalahari Desert and the country of Mashona.
We passed through large tracts of Mopane country, and my men caught
a great many of the birds called Korwe (`Tockus erythrorhynchus')
in their breeding-places, which were in holes in the mopane-trees.
On the 19th we passed the nest of a korwe just ready for the female to enter;
the orifice was plastered on both sides, but a space was left
of a heart shape, and exactly the size of the bird's body.
The hole in the tree was in every case found to be prolonged
some distance upward above the opening, and thither the korwe always fled
to escape being caught. In another nest we found that one white egg,
much like that of a pigeon, was laid, and the bird dropped another
when captured. She had four besides in the ovarium. The first time
that I saw this bird was at Kolobeng, where I had gone to the forest
for some timber. Standing by a tree, a native looked behind me
and exclaimed, "There is the nest of a korwe." I saw a slit only,
about half an inch wide and three or four inches long,
in a slight hollow of the tree. Thinking the word korwe denoted
some small animal, I waited with interest to see what he would extract;
he broke the clay which surrounded the slit, put his arm into the hole,
and brought out a `Tockus', or `red-beaked hornbill', which he killed.
He informed me that, when the female enters her nest, she submits
to a real confinement. The male plasters up the entrance,
leaving only a narrow slit by which to feed his mate, and which exactly suits
the form of his beak. The female makes a nest of her own feathers,
lays her eggs, hatches them, and remains with the young
till they are fully fledged. During all this time, which is stated to be
two or three months, the male continues to feed her and the young family.
The prisoner generally becomes quite fat, and is esteemed a very dainty morsel
by the natives, while the poor slave of a husband gets so lean that,
on the sudden lowering of the temperature which sometimes happens
after a fall of rain, he is benumbed, falls down, and dies. I never had
an opportunity of ascertaining the actual length of the confinement,
but on passing the same tree at Kolobeng about eight days afterward
the hole was plastered up again, as if, in the short time that had elapsed,
the disconsolate husband had secured another wife. We did not disturb her,
and my duties prevented me from returning to the spot. This is the month
in which the female enters the nest. We had seen one of these,
as before mentioned, with the plastering not quite finished;
we saw many completed; and we received the very same account here
that we did at Kolobeng, that the bird comes forth when the young
are fully fledged, at the period when the corn is ripe;
indeed, her appearance abroad with her young is one of the signs they have
for knowing when it ought to be so. As that is about the end of April,
the time is between two and three months.
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