In strength the rhinoceros is scarcely inferior to the elephant. Of its prodigious power sufficient evidence was shown in the manner in which it charged the missionary wagon, as mentioned at page 50 of this volume. It is on record, moreover, that the rhinoceros which Emanuel, King of Portugal, sent to the Pope in the year 1513, destroyed, in a paroxysm of fury, the vessel in which he was transported.
Ungainly and heavy as the rhinoceros looks, it is, nevertheless, so exceedingly swift of foot—at least as regards the black species—“that a horse with a rider,” to quote the words of Gordon Cumming, “can rarely manage to overtake it.” The testimony of Captain Harris is to the like effect; for, when speaking of the chase of this animal, and after telling us that it is most difficult to kill, he says, “From its clumsy appearance, one would never suppose it could dart about as it does, like lightning.”
The food of the rhinoceros consists entirely, as mentioned, of vegetables, shoots of trees, grasses, &c. It is fond of the sugar-cane, and eats all kinds of grain;[76] but it does not seem to be a voracious feeder. Indeed, it would appear to be somewhat fastidious in the selection of its food, in search of which it wanders far and wide.
Water is indispensable to the rhinoceros, and, even if his usual haunts be distant from the fountain, he seeks it at least once in the course of the twenty-four hours, as well to quench his thirst as to wallow in the mud, with which his body is frequently incrusted, leaving to the thirsty traveler nothing but a mass of well-kneaded dough.
FŒTUS OF RHINOCEROS KEITLOA.
Little seems to be known of the breeding habits of this animal: whether it lives in monogamy, or has a plurality of wives, and so forth. It appears certain, however, that the female only produces one young at a birth, and that, too, at considerable intervals. During the first month, the young rhinoceros exceeds not the size of a large dog, with the merest indication of horns. A complete and full-grown fœtus of R. Keitloa that I once obtained measured thus:
| Ft. | In. | |
| Length of body (from tip of nose, over the head, and along the back) to insertion of tail | 3 | 6 |
| Length of tail | 0 | 10 |
| Circumference of body behind shoulder | 2 | 4 |
| ” neck | 1 | 6 |
| ” head (across the eyes) | 1 | 8 |
| Height at the shoulder | 2 | 1 |
| Length of head between ears and eyes | 0 | 4½ |
| Breadth ” ” ” | 0 | 4 |
| ” ” ” eyes (corner nearest nostrils) | 0 | 7 |