African Nature Notes and Reminiscences

by Frederick Courteney Selous

The one occasion on which I had to fire at an advancing black rhinoceros because I could not make it turn was on April 25, 1878. At that time I was making my way from the Zambesi river to Matabeleland, through an uninhabited piece of country which had never previously been traversed by a white man. I was very weak and ill from fever and privation, and on meeting with a black rhinoceros early in the morning, was anxious to kill it for the sake of the meat. When the animal, however, an old bull, first came trotting towards me, I did not fire at it, as I thought I could make more certain of killing it with a shot through the lungs as it turned to run off. But it would not turn, but kept advancing steadily towards me without taking any notice of my shouts, until it was so near that I determined to try and kill it with a shot in the front of the head. I was at that time armed with a single-barrelled ten-bore rifle, which was carefully sighted and shot very accurately, and when the rhinoceros was within fifteen yards of where I stood, and still slowly but steadily advancing, I put a bullet past its horns and into its forehead. It fell to the shot and rolled on its side, but almost immediately raised its head and brought it down again on the ground with a thump. I saw that it was only stunned, just as the one had been which I had lost some five years previously, after having hit it in almost exactly the same place with a four-ounce bullet; so I ran close up to it and killed it with a bullet behind the shoulder, just as it swung itself up into a sitting position. What this rhinoceros would have done if I had not fired I do not know. I think it very likely, however, that had I turned and run for a tree, it might have rushed after me and struck at me with its horn. Some of the others, too, which had trotted up towards me in previous years might have done the same thing, if they had suddenly seen me running close in front of them. I have twice had the same experience as that described by Gordon Cumming when he galloped in front of a black rhinoceros which he had wounded, that is to say, I have been smartly chased by two of these animals. The first was a cow with a nearly full-grown calf. These two animals went off at a swift trot as soon as they scented me, breaking into a gallop when I pressed them. I then tried to pass them, so as to get a broadside shot; but directly my horse drew level with her, the cow charged in the most determined manner, snorting furiously and chasing me for a considerable distance. This incident occurred in 1880. In 1883, when hunting on horseback just outside the "fly" country on the upper Sabi river, I one day came across an old bull black rhinoceros which, though it ran off in the first instance as soon as it saw or scented me, turned and chased me smartly, with the usual accompaniment of snorts and puffs, as soon as my horse drew level with it. It chased me certainly for over a hundred yards, and pressed my horse pretty hard. As it swerved off and stopped snorting, I brought my horse round, and dismounting, gave it a shot in the ribs; but on galloping up near it again, it gave me another smart chase. Two more bullets, however, finished this plucky old animal.

Besides these two, I can only call to mind eight other black rhinoceroses which I chased on horseback, and none of these showed any fight at all, but kept continually sheering off as the horse drew level with them, making it almost impossible to get anything but a stern shot. In November 1874 I chased a black rhinoceros bull out into an open expanse of ground near Thamma-Setjie, on the old waggon road to the Zambesi, and in trying to get a broadside shot, rode it round and round in a large circle, until it presently stood still with its mouth open, evidently completely done. Even when I dismounted and shot it at close range—I only had an old smooth-bore gun—it never attempted to charge.

Several times, when hunting elephants in the early 'seventies of the last century, black rhinoceroses rushed snorting either close in front of or close behind myself and my small party of Kafirs. They had undoubtedly been alarmed by hearing or smelling us, and were, I think, trying to get out of danger; but I believe that, should a rhinoceros get the wind of the foremost man amongst a long string of porters, and on starting off to run away from the disagreeable smell, suddenly find itself confronted by another portion of the caravan, it will not turn back, but rush snorting through the line, sometimes perhaps injuring a man in its passage. It is, I think, owing to the fact that travellers, traders, and hunters in East Africa have always employed very large numbers of porters, who marched in single file in a line often extending to several hundred yards in length, that incidents of this kind have been so frequent in that country. But when a black rhinoceros just rushes through a long line of porters without singling out and following any particular man, I think such a proceeding is more the result of panic than anything else. My view is that the wind blowing obliquely across the line being taken by a caravan may reach a rhinoceros lying or standing some distance away. This animal at once takes alarm and runs off, at first perhaps at right angles to the direction from which the wind is blowing; but on again turning up wind, as rhinoceroses almost invariably do, it comes right on to another portion of the straggling line of porters. Confronted by this line of men, whom it had at first tried to avoid, it will probably not turn back, but rather charge through them and continue its flight. The sight of the black rhinoceros is certainly very bad, and in cases where these animals have charged against waggons in South Africa, and trains on the Uganda Railway, it is difficult to say whether they were animated by pure bad temper or ran against these obstacles because they suddenly saw them moving right across their path, when they were endeavouring to escape from some other danger.

Upon three occasions during 1873 black rhinoceroses came close up to my camp at night, snorting loudly, and upon one occasion, as I shall relate in a subsequent chapter, a white one did the same thing. On all these occasions, I think the curiosity of these rhinoceroses must have been aroused by the sight of the camp fires, or else the smell of blood and meat must have excited them. I fired into one of the black rhinoceroses as he was coming very close, and drove off the other two by shouting at them.

That a certain proportion of the vanished race of South African rhinoceroses of the prehensile-lipped species were of a morose and savage temper, and therefore dangerous animals to encounter, I will not for one moment attempt to deny, for there is a great deal of evidence that this was the case. But what I do think is that many writers have taken the character of the exceptionally vicious animals they met with as typical of that of the whole species. But, unless at least a very considerable proportion of black rhinoceroses were neither savage nor dangerous, I fail to understand why it was that none of those that I myself encountered behaved in a manner befitting their reputation; how it has come about that the whole race has been practically exterminated in South Africa at so infinitesimal a cost to human life; why Gordon Cumming, who shot so many of these "hideous monsters," only appears to have met with two adventures—both of a very mild character—with these animals; and why Baldwin never seemed to have the least idea that they were either dangerous to attack or subject to sudden paroxysms of unprovoked fury.

Hitherto I have only spoken of the black rhinoceros in South Africa; but the testimony of the most experienced hunters, in other parts of the continent, seems to show that the character of this animal has always been essentially the same throughout its entire range. Everywhere it seems to have been and to be a stupid, blundering, bad-sighted, but keen-scented beast; in the great majority of cases doing its best to avoid human beings, but always liable to become savage when wounded, like elephants, lions, and buffaloes, and sometimes being really bad-tempered and savage by nature, and ready to charge unprovoked at the sight or scent of any one approaching it. My own experience proves at least that it is quite possible to come across a great number of black rhinoceroses without ever encountering a really vicious one.

In those countries which now form part of North-Western Rhodesia, through which I travelled many years ago, black rhinoceroses were by no means plentiful. In fact, though I from time to time came across their tracks, I never actually saw a rhinoceros in the flesh to the north of the Zambesi. Throughout British Central Africa, too, I believe I am correct in stating that these animals have never been found in any great number. It was somewhere in this territory that my friend Captain C. H. Stigand was severely injured by a black rhinoceros. I have heard the story of this misadventure from his own lips, and I think there can be no doubt that the animal which suddenly charged and tossed him without provocation was one of those vicious, dangerous brutes whose exceptionally savage tempers have given a bad name to the whole species.

In a footnote to the article on the black rhinoceros contributed to the Great and Small Game of Africa by Mr. F. Vaughan Kirby, that writer says, in speaking of the character of this animal: "I know an instance of a native being charged and killed, and another whom I met personally who was chased and regularly hunted by a wounded one, which caught and fearfully mutilated him."

Judging by his own personal experience, Mr. Kirby came to the conclusion that, "although naturally timid, and certainly not dangerously aggressive, the black rhinoceros is of most uncertain temper, and when wounded and encountered at close quarters, can and will charge most fiercely, and occasionally is as vindictive as any buffalo." The adjective "vindictive" here used by Mr. Kirby does not appear to me to be quite the right or fair one. If an elephant, buffalo, lion, or rhinoceros should be attacked and grievously injured by a human being, and is brave and stubborn enough to resent such treatment and make a fight for its life, it seems like adding insult to injury to speak of it as vindictive.

In many parts of both British and German East Africa black rhinoceroses were quite recently, and in some cases probably still are, extraordinarily numerous. Here, as in other parts of Africa, a certain number of accidents have occurred in hunting these animals, and there have been a good many instances of their charging through a line of native porters. However, although it is unquestionable that in East Africa, as elsewhere, black rhinoceroses have sometimes shown themselves to be really vicious, and therefore very dangerous animals, there seems to be a concensus of opinion amongst those men who have had the greatest experience with them, that these were the exceptions to the general rule.