Frank and Fred were standing on the bank, and happened to be looking at a raft which carried two men. Evidently one of them was blind, as his eyes were closed, and he carried no oar or paddle.
Close by them was a hippopotamus of more than ordinary size, and Fred remarked that the raft seemed to be going directly for him.
"The man at the stern doesn't see the beast," said Frank, "or he wouldn't be likely to run the risk of disturbing him."
"I think so too," replied his cousin, "for they haven't anything to make a fight with, and if the 'hippo' attacks them they're in great danger."
HIPPOPOTAMUS ATTACKING A RAFT.
Just as he spoke the bow of the raft touched the back of what Fred called the "hippo," and evidently touched him with considerable force. The animal turned, as Frank had predicted, and attacked the frail vessel with his enormous jaws.
It was a brief combat, and an unequal one. The man at the bow was, as they afterward learned, stone-blind, and therefore unaware of the danger that threatened him. The beast seized him with the quickness of a flash, overturning the raft and upsetting the other man into the water. The victim of the attack was killed instantly. Other boats and rafts went to the rescue of the man struggling in the water, and he was saved from the crocodiles, with which the stream abounds.
The hippopotamus went away unmolested, as the natives had no weapons that could make an impression on his thick hide. Doctor Bronson called for his heaviest rifle, but before he secured it the monarch of the river was safe below the waters.