As if seeking for an answer, his eyes were raised to heaven, and then wandered around the plain. All at once they became fixed upon a singular object, that appeared at some distance off, and was just emerging from the bushes.
It was an animal of some kind, and from its vast size Von Bloom and the others at first took it to be an elephant. None of them, except Swartboy, were accustomed to elephants in their wild state,—for, although these animals once inhabited the most southerly portion of Africa, they have long since deserted the settled districts, and are now only to be found far beyond the frontier of the colony. But they knew that there were elephants in these parts—as they had already observed their tracks—and all now supposed the huge creature that was approaching must be one.
Not all, Swartboy was an exception. As soon as his eyes fell upon the animal he cried out,—
“Chukuroo—a chukuroo!”
“A rhinoster, is it?” said Von Bloom, knowing that “chuckuroo” was the native name for the rhinoceros, or “rhinoster,” as he called it in Dutch.
“Ya, baas,” replied Swartboy; “and one o' da big karles—da, 'kobaoba,' da long-horn white rhinoster.”
What Swartboy meant by this was that the animal in question was a large species of rhinoceros, known among the natives as the “kobaoba.”
Now I dare say, young reader, you have been all your life under the impression that there was but one species of rhinoceros in the world—that is the rhinoceros. Is it not so? Yes.
Well, permit me to inform you, that you have been under a wrong impression. There are quite a number of distinct species of this very singular animal. At least eight distinct kinds I know of; and I do not hesitate to say that when the central parts of Africa have been fully explored, as well as South Asia and the Asiatic islands, nearly half as many more will be found to exist.
In South Africa four distinct species are well known; one in North Africa differs from all these; while the large Indian rhinoceros bears but slight resemblance to any of them. A distinct species from any is the rhinoceros of Sumatra, an inhabitant of that island; and still another is the Java rhinoceros, found in the island of Java. Thus we have no less than eight kinds, all specifically differing from one another.