Upon the dry weather setting in ... the mud
becomes hard and crusted, and the rhinoceros cannot effect his escape
without considerable difficulty and exertion. The Semangs prepare
themselves with large quantities of combustible materials, with which they
quietly approach the animal, who is aroused from his reverie by an immense
fire over him, which being kept well supplied by the Semangs with fresh
fuel, soon completes his destruction, and renders him in a fit state to
make a meal of." (J. Ind. Arch. IV. 426.)[5] There is a great difference
in aspect between the one-horned species (Rh. Sondaicus and Rh.
Indicus) and the two-horned. The Malays express what that difference is
admirably, in calling the last Badak-Karbau, "the Buffalo-Rhinoceros,"
and the Sondaicus Badak-Gajah, "the Elephant-Rhinoceros."
The belief in the formidable nature of the tongue of the rhinoceros is
very old and wide-spread, though I can find no foundation for it but the
rough appearance of the organ. ["His tongue also is somewhat of a
rarity, for, if he can get any of his antagonists down, he will lick them
so clean, that he leaves neither skin nor flesh to cover his bones." (A.
Hamilton, ed. 1727, II. 24. M.S. Note of Yule.) Compare what is said of
the tongue of the Yak, I. p. 277. - H.C.] The Chinese have the belief, and
the Jesuit Lecomte attests it from professed observation of the animal in
confinement. (Chin. Repos. VII. 137; Lecomte, II. 406.) [In a Chinese
work quoted by Mr. Groeneveldt (T'oung Pao, VII. No. 2, abst. p. 19) we
read that "the rhinoceros has thorns on its tongue and always eats the
thorns of plants and trees, but never grasses or leaves." - H.C.]
The legend to which Marco alludes, about the Unicorn allowing itself to be
ensnared by a maiden (and of which Marsden has made an odd perversion in
his translation, whilst indicating the true meaning in his note), is also
an old and general one. It will be found, for example, in Brunetto Latini,
in the Image du Monde, in the Mirabilia of Jordanus,[6] and in the
verses of Tzetzes. The latter represents Monoceros as attracted not by the
maiden's charms but by her perfumery. So he is inveigled and blindfolded
by a stout young knave, disguised as a maiden and drenched with scent: -
"'Tis then the huntsmen hasten up, abandoning their ambush;
Clean from his head they chop his horn, prized antidote to poison;
And let the docked and luckless beast escape into the jungles."
- V. 399, seqq.
In the cut which we give of this from a mediaeval source the horn of the
unicorn is evidently the tusk of a narwhal. This confusion arose very
early, as may be seen from its occurrence in Aelian, who says that the
horn of the unicorn or Kartazonon (the Arab Karkaddan or Rhinoceros)
was not straight but twisted ([Greek: eligmous echon tinas], Hist. An.
xvi. 20). The mistake may also be traced in the illustrations to Cosmas
Indicopleustes from his own drawings, and it long endured, as may be seen
in Jerome Cardan's description of a unicorn's horn which he saw suspended
in the church of St. Denis; as well as in a circumstance related by P.
della Valle (II. 491; and Cardan, de Varietate, c. xcvii.). Indeed the
supporter of the Royal arms retains the narwhal horn. To this popular
error is no doubt due the reading in Pauthier's text, which makes the horn
white instead of black.
[Illustration: Monoceros and the Maiden.[7]]
We may quote the following quaint version of the fable from the Bestiary
of Philip de Thaun, published by Mr. Wright (Popular Treatises on
Science, etc. p. 81):
"Monosceros est Beste, un corne ad en la teste,
Purceo ad si a nun, de buc ad facun;
Par Pucele est prise; or vez en quel guise.
Quant hom le volt cacer et prendre et enginner,
Si vent hom al forest u sis riparis est;
La met une Pucele hors de sein sa mamele,
Et par odurement Monosceros la sent;
Dunc vent a la Pucele, et si baiset la mamele,
En sein devant se dort, issi vent a sa mort
Li hom suivent atant ki l'ocit en dormant
U trestout vif le prent, si fais puis sun talent.
Grant chose signifie."....
And so goes on to moralise the fable.
NOTE 6. - In the J. Indian Archip. V. 285, there is mention of the Falco
Malaiensis, black, with a double white-and-brown spotted tail, said to
belong to the ospreys, "but does not disdain to take birds and other
game."
[1] See Anderson's Missing to East Coast of Sumatra. pp. 229, 233 and
map. The Ferlec of Polo was identified by Valentyn. (Sumatra, in
vol. v. p. 21.) Marsden remarks that a terminal k is in Sumatra
always softened or omitted in pronunciation. (H. of Sum. 1st. ed. p.
163.) Thus we have Perlak, and Perla, as we have Battak and Batta.
[2] Since this engraving was made a fourth species has been established,
Rhin lasyotis, found near Chittagong.
[3] The elephant of India has 6 true ribs and 13 false ribs, that of
Sumatra and Ceylon has 6 true and 14 false.
[4] Marsden, however, does say that a one-horned species (Rh. sondaicus?)
is also found on Sumatra (3rd ed. of his H. of Sumatra, p. 116).
[5] An American writer professes to have discovered in Missouri the fossil
remains of a bogged mastodon, which had been killed precisely in this
way by human contemporaries. (See Lubbock, Preh. Times, ad ed. 279.)
[6] Tresor, p. 253; N. and E., V. 263; Jordanus, p. 43.
[7] Another mediaeval illustration of the subject is given in Les Arts au
Moyen Age, p. 499, from the binding of a book. It is allegorical, and
the Maiden is there the Virgin Mary.
