Chapter IV: Part 4

After lying about an hour, now and then raising its head, and swivelling its eyeballs towards the keeper, or playfully opening its huge mouth, and threatening to bite the leg of the chair on which the keeper sat, the Hippopotamus rose, and walked very slowly about its room, and then uttered a loud and short harsh snort four or five times in quick succession, reminding one of the snort of a horse, and ending with an explosive sound, like a bark. The keeper understood the language--the animal desired to return to its bath.

The Hippopotamus carried its head rather depressed, reminding one of a large prize hog, but with a breadth of muzzle and other features peculiarly its own. The keeper opened the door leading into a paddock, and walked thence to the bath, the Hippopotamus following, like a dog, close to his heels. On arriving at the bath-room, the animal descended with some deliberation the flight of low steps leading into the water, stooped and drank a little, dipped his head under, and then plunged forwards. The creature seemed inspired with new life and activity. Sinking to the bottom of the bath, and moving about submerged for a while, it suddenly rose with a bound almost bodily out of the water. Splashing back, it commenced swimming and plunging about, rolling from side to side, taking in mouthfuls of water and spirting them out again, raising every now and then its huge and grotesque head, and biting the woodwork of the margin of the bath. The broad rounded back of the animal being now chiefly in view, it seemed a much larger object than when out of the water.

After half an hour spent in this amusement, the Hippopotamus quitted the water at the call of its keeper, and followed him back to the sleeping-room, which was well bedded with straw, and where a stuffed sack was provided for its pillow, of which the animal, having a very short neck, thicker than the head, availed itself when it slept. When awake, it was very impatient of any absence of its favourite attendant. It would rise on its hind legs, and threaten to break down the wooden fence, by butting and pushing against it in a way very significant of its great muscular force. The animal appeared to be in perfect health, and breathed, when at rest, slowly and regularly, from three to four times in a minute. Its food was now a kind of porridge, of milk and maize-meat, it being more than half weaned from milk diet. Its appetite had been in no respect diminished by the confinement and inconvenience of the sea voyage, or by change of climate. All observers appear to have agreed that, to see the Hippopotamus rightly, is to see him in the water. There his activity is only surpassed by that of the otter or the seal. Such was one of the opportunities afforded to zoologists for "studying this most remarkable and interesting African mammal, of which no living specimen had been seen in Europe since the period when Hippopotami were last exhibited by the third Gordian in the amphitheatre of imperial Rome."[7]

It is now time to glance at the general economy of the Hippopotamus, as he is seen in his native rivers and wilds. In early days, as his Roman name imports, it was usual to consider him as a species of horse, inhabiting rivers and marshy grounds, and, in a more especial manner, the denizen of the Nile. The genus is placed by Linnæus among his _belluæ_, between _equus_ and _sus_. The skeleton approaches that of the ox and of the hog, but it presents differences from that of any other animal.

The Hippopotamus is found not only in the Nile, but in the rivers of southern Africa. In the former stream of marvels, Hasselquist relates that "the oftener the River Horse goes on shore, the better hope have the Egyptians of a sufficient swelling or increase of the Nile." Again, they say that the River Horse is an inveterate enemy to the crocodile, and kills it whenever he meets it; adding that he does much damage to the Egyptians in those places he frequents. He goes on shore, and, in a short space of time, destroys an entire field of corn or clover, not leaving the least verdure, for he is very voracious.

Yet neither of these stories is so marvellous as that which a sailor related to Dampier, the old traveller:--"I have seen," says the mariner, "one of these animals open its jaws, and, seizing a boat between its teeth, at one bite sink it to the bottom. I have seen it, on another occasion, place itself under one of our boats, and, rising under it, overset it with six men who were in it, but who, however, happily received no other injury."

Professor Smith and Captain Tuckey, in exploring the Congo River, in South Africa, saw in a beautiful sandy cove, at the opening of a creek, behind a long projecting point, an immense number of Hippopotami; and in the evening a number of alligators were also seen there; an association hardly consistent with the hostility related by Hasselquist.

Captain Tuckey observed Hippopotami with their heads above the water, "snorting in the air." In another part of his narrative he says:--"Many Hippopotami were visible close to our tents at Condo Yanga. No use firing at these animals in the water; the only way is to wait till they come on shore to feed at night."

Le Vaillant had an opportunity of watching the progress of a Hippopotamus under water at Great River, which contained many of these animals. On all sides he could hear them bellow and blow. Anxious to observe them, he mounted on the top of an elevated rock which advanced into the river, and he saw one walking at the bottom of the water. Le Vaillant killed it at the moment when it came to the surface to breathe. It was a very old female, and many people, in their surprise, and to express its size, called it the Grandmother of the River.

The traveller Lander tells us that, on the Niger. Hippopotami are termed water-elephants. One stormy night, as they were sailing up this unexplored current, they fell in with great numbers of Hippopotami, who came plashing, snorting, and plunging all round the canoe. Thinking to frighten them off, the travellers fired a shot or two at them, but the noise only called up from the water and out of the fens about as many more Hippopotami, and they were more closely beset than before. Lander's people, who had never, in all their lives, been exposed to such formidable beasts, trembled with fear, and absolutely wept aloud; whilst peals of thunder rattled over their heads, and the most vivid lightning showed the terrifying scene. Hippopotami frequently upset canoes in the river. When the Landers fired, every one of them came to the surface of the water, and pursued them over to the north bank. A second firing was followed by a loud roaring noise. However, the Hippopotami did the travellers no kind of mischief whatever.

Captain Gordon, when among the Bakalahari, in South Africa, bagged no fewer than fifteen first-rate Hippopotami; the greater number of them being bulls.

In 1828, there was brought to England the head of a Hippopotamus, with all the flesh about it, in high preservation. The animal was harpooned while in combat with a crocodile in a lake in the interior of Africa. The head measured nearly four feet in length, and eight feet in circumference; the jaws opened two feet, and the cutting teeth, of which it had four in each jaw, were above a foot long, and four inches in circumference.

The utility of this vast pachydermatous, or thick-skinned animal, to man is considerable. That he can be destructive has already been shown in his clearance of the cultivated banks of rivers. The enormous ripping, chisel-like teeth of the lower jaw fit him for uprooting. The ancient Egyptians held the animal as an emblem of power, though this may have arisen from his reputed destruction of the crocodile. The flesh is much esteemed for food, both among the natives and colonists of South Africa. The blood of the animal is said to have been used by the old Indian painters in mixing their colours. The skin is extensively employed for making whips.

But there is no part of the Hippopotamus more in request than the great canine teeth, the ivory of which is so highly valued by dentists for making artificial teeth, on account of its keeping its colour better than any other kind. This superiority was not unknown to the ancients Pausanias mentions the statue of Dindymene, whose face was formed of the teeth of Hippopotami, instead of elephants' ivory. The canine teeth are imported in great numbers into England, and sell at a very high price. From the closeness of the ivory, the weight of the teeth, a part only of which is available for the artificial purpose above mentioned, is great in proportion to its bulk; and the article has fetched about thirty shillings per pound.

The ancient history of the Hippopotamus is extremely curious, and we have many representations of him in coins, in sculpture, and in paintings, which prove, beyond question, that the artists, as well as the writers, had a distinct knowledge of what they intended to represent.

The earliest notice which occurs in any author, and which has been considered by many to be a description of the Hippopotamus, is the celebrated account in the fortieth and forty-first chapter of the Book of Job of Behemoth and Leviathan. Many learned men have contended that "Behemoth" really means "Elephant," and thus the Zurich version of the Bible translates the Hebrew by "Elephas."

In the edition of the English Bible, printed by Robert Barker, in 1615, for King James I., and since considered as the authorised version, the word "Behemoth" is preserved in the text, and the following annotation is added:--"This beast is thought to bee the Elephant, or some other which is unknowen." Bochart, Ludolph, and some others, have contended warmly in favour of the Hippopotamus. Cuvier thinks, that though this animal is probably intended, yet that the description is too vague for any one to hold a certain opinion on the subject. The theory started by Bochart, and in the main supported by Cuvier, is generally supposed the real one. The description in the Book of Job, though doubtless vague, and in the highest degree poetical, has yet sufficient marks to render the identification perfectly easy, while there are certain peculiarities mentioned, which even a poetical imagination could hardly apply to the Elephant. Thus, when it is said of him, "He lieth under the shady trees, in the desert of the reed and fens; ... the willows of the brook compass him round about," this would seem to be the description of an animal which frequented the water much more than Elephants are accustomed to do. Again, in the fuller description of "Leviathan," in the forty-first chapter, we think it is quite clear that a water animal is intended, though what is there stated might be held to apply to the crocodile as well as the Hippopotamus; both are animals remarkable for extreme toughness of skin, and both are almost equally difficult to kill or to take alive.

Of profane authors, Herodotus is the first who notices this animal, but his account is far from accurate: the size he states as large as the biggest ox. That the animal was sacred, in some parts at least, appears from Herodotus, who says:--"Those which are found in the district of Paprennis are sacred, but in other parts of Egypt they are not considered in the same light." Aristotle makes it no bigger than an ass; Diodorus, an elephant; Pliny ascribes to it the tail and teeth of a boar, adding, that helmets and bucklers are made of the skin. Hippopotami figured in the triumphal processions of the Roman conquerors on their return home. M. Scaurus exhibited five crocodiles and an Hippopotamus; and Augustus one in his triumph over Cleopatra. Antoninus exhibited Hippopotami, with lions and other animals; Commodus no less than five, some of which he slew with his own hand. Heliogabalus, and the third Gordian, also exhibited Hippopotami.

The Hippopotamus of the London Zoological Society was joined by his mate, the more juvenile "Adhela," in 1853. Two Hippopotami have lately been born in Europe; one in the Garden of Plants, at Paris, in 1858; and another in the Zoological Gardens at Amsterdam, in 1866.

With regard to the alleged disappearance of the Hippopotamus from Lower Egypt, Cuvier remarks, that the French savans attached to the Expedition to Egypt, who ascended the Nile above Syene, did not meet with one.

In some of the rivers of Liberia, and other parts, perhaps, of Western Africa, a second species of Hippopotamus exists, and is proved to be a very distinct animal.

We have yet to glance at the Hippopotami of a former world. Many species are recognised in the fossil remains of Europe and Asia as formerly existing in England and in France. Cuvier detected bones of the Hippopotamus among the fossil wealth of the Great Kirkdale Cavern in Yorkshire, in 1821. They have also been found in France, and especially in the Sewatick Hills in India.

In the Museum of the London Zoological Society are two skulls of Hippopotami--one fossil. This measures two feet three inches, and allowing for skin and lip, two feet six inches. Now, as the head is about one-fifth the length of the body, without the tail, the full-grown animal would be little, if any, short of fifteen feet from nose to tail--a size worthy the description of the Behemoth.

We may here add, that Burckhardt, in his "Travels in Nubia," describes the voice of the Hippopotamus as a hard and heavy sound, like the creaking or groaning of a large wooden door. This noise, he says, is made when the animal raises his huge head out of the water, and when he retires into it again.

FOOTNOTE:

[7] Professor Owen.

LION-TALK.

The Lion has, within the present century, lost caste, and fallen considerably from his high estate. He has been stripped of much of his conventional reputation by the spirit of inquiry into the validity of olden notions, which characterises the present age; and it appears that much of his celebrity is founded upon popular error. Nor are these results the work of stay-at-home travellers; but they are derived from the observation and experience of those who, amidst scenes of perilous adventure, seek to enlarge and correct our views of the habit and character of the overrated Lion.

Mr. Bennett, in his admirable work, "The Tower Menagerie," has these very sensible remarks:--"In speaking of the Lion we call up to our imaginations the splendid picture of might unmingled with ferocity, of courage undebased by guile, of dignity tempered by grace and ennobled by generosity. Such is the Lion of Buffon; who, in describing this animal, as in too many other instances, has suffered himself to be borne along by the strong tide of popular opinion; but, as the Lion appears in his native regions, according to the authentic accounts of those travellers and naturalists who have had the best means of correctly observing his habits, he is by no means so admirable a creature. Where the timid antelope and powerless monkey fall his easy and unresisting prey--or where the elephant and buffalo find their unwieldy bulk and strength no adequate protection against his impetuous agility--he stalks boldly to and fro in fearless majesty. But in the neighbourhood of man--even in that of uncultivated savages--_he skulks in treacherous ambush for his prey_. Of his forbearance and generosity it can merely be said, that when free, he destroys only what is sufficient to satiate his hunger or revenge; and when in captivity--his wants being provided for, and his feelings not irritated--he suffers smaller animals to live unmolested in his den, or submits to the control of a keeper by whom he is fed. But even this limited degree of docility is liable to fearful interruptions from the calls of hunger, the feelings of revenge--and these he frequently cherishes for a long period--with various other circumstances which render it dangerous to approach him in his most domesticated state, without ascertaining his immediate mood and temper. That an animal which seldom attacks by open force, but silently approaches his victim, and when he imagines his prey to be within his reach, bounds upon it with an overwhelming leap, should ever have been regarded as the type of courage and the emblem of magnanimity, is indeed most astonishing!"

The generosity of disposition so liberally accorded to this powerful beast has been much and eloquently praised; and it seems hard to dissipate the glowing vision which Buffon has raised; but, if there is any dependence to be placed on the observations of those travellers who have had the best opportunities of judging, and have the highest character for veracity, we must be compelled to acknowledge that Buffon's Lion is the Lion of poetry and prejudice, and very unlike the cautious lurking savage that steals on its comparatively weak prey by surprise, overwhelms it at once by the terror, the weight, and the violence of the attack, and is intent only on the gratification of the appetite. "At the time," says Mr. Burchell, "when men first adopted the Lion as the emblem of courage, it would seem that they regarded great size and strength as indicating it; but they were greatly mistaken in the character they had given of the indolent animal." Indeed, Mr. Burchell calls the Lion an "indolent skulking animal." The fact of the Lion sparing the dog that was thrown to him, and making a friend of the little animal that was destined for his prey, has been much dwelt on; but these and other such acts of mercy, as they have been called, may be very easily accounted for. If not pressed by hunger, the Lion will seldom be at the trouble of killing prey; and the desire for a companion has created much stronger friendships between animals in confinement than between a Lion and a little dog. St. Pierre touchingly describes the Lion of Versailles, who, in 1792, lived most happily with a dog, and on whose death he became disconsolate and miserable; and in confinement the "lordly Lion," as Young calls him, has been known to be deeply afflicted with melancholy at similar losses.

The Lion is easily tamed, and capable of attachment to man. The story of Androdas, frequently called Androcles, is too well known to need more than allusion; but in this and other stories of Lions licking men's hands without injuring them, there must be a stretch of fancy; for the Lion's tongue has sharp thorn-points, inclining backwards, so as not to be able to lick the hand without tearing away the skin, which any one will understand who has _heard_ the Lion tear the raw meat away from the bone of his food.

Still, very different accounts are given by travellers of the cruelty or generosity of the Lion's nature; which results, in all probability, from a difference in time or circumstances, or the degree of hunger which the individual experienced when the respective observations were made upon him.

Meanwhile, there are many points in the history of the Lion which are yet but imperfectly understood; the explanations of which, whilst they are interesting, add to our correct knowledge of this still extraordinary animal.

The Lion has been styled "The King of the Forest," which is not very applicable to him, seeing that Mr. Burchell at least never met with but one Lion on the plains; nor did he ever meet with one in any of the forests where he had been. The low cover that creeps along the sides of streams, the patches that mark the springs in the rank grass of the valley, seem to be the shelter which the African Lion, for the most part, seeks. His strength is extraordinary. To carry off a man (and there are dismal accounts of this horrible fact, which there is no reason to doubt) appears a feat of no difficulty to this powerful brute. A Cape Lion, seizing a heifer in his mouth, has carried her off with the same ease as a cat does a rat; and has leaped with her over a broad dyke without the least difficulty. A young Lion, too, has conveyed a horse about a mile from the spot where he had killed it.

There seems to be an idea that the Lion preserves human prey; but, be this as it may, the inhabitants of certain districts have been under the necessity of resorting to a curious expedient to get out of the Lion's reach. Ælian, by the way, records the extinction of a Libyan people by an invasion of Lions. We read of a large tree, in the country of the Mantatees, which has amidst its limbs fourteen conical huts. These are used as dormitories, being beyond the reach of the Lions, which, since the incursions of the Mantatees, when so many thousands of persons were massacred, have become very numerous in the neighbourhood, and destructive to human life. The branches of the above trees are supported by forked sticks or poles, and there are three tiers or platforms on which the huts are constructed. The lowest is nine feet from the ground, and holds ten huts; the second, about eight feet high, has three huts; and the upper story, if it may be so called, contains four. The ascent to these is made by notches cut in the poles; the huts are built with twigs, and thatched with straw, and will contain two persons conveniently. This tree stands at the base of a range of mountains due east of Kurrichaine, in a place called "Ongorutcie Fountain," about 1,000 miles north-east of Cape Town. Kurrichaine is the Staffordshire as well as the Birmingham of that part of South Africa. There are likewise whole villages of huts erected on stakes, about eight feet from the ground; the inhabitants, it is stated, sit under the shade of these platforms during the day, and retire to the elevated huts at night.

Though mortal accidents frequently occur in Lion-hunting, the cool sportsman seldom fails of using his rifle with effect. Lions, when roused, it seems, walk off quietly at first, and if no cover is near, and they are not pursued, they gradually mend their pace to a trot, till they have reached a good distance, and then they bound away. Their demeanour is careless, as if they did not want a fray, but if pressed, are ready to fight it out. If they are pursued closely, they turn and crouch, generally with their faces to the adversary: then the nerves of the sportsman are tried. If he is collected, and master of his craft, the well-directed rifle ends the scene at once; but if, in the flutter of the moment, the vital parts are missed, or the ball passes by, leaving the Lion unhurt, the infuriated beast frequently charges on his enemies, dealing destruction around him. This, however, is not always the case; and a steady, unshrinking deportment has, in some instances, saved the life of the hunter.

There is hardly a book of African travels which does not teem with the dangers and hair-breadth escapes of the Lion-hunters; and hardly one that does not include a fatal issue to some engaged in this hazardous sport. The modes of destruction employed against the powerful beast are very various--from the poisonous arrow of the Bushman to the rifle of the colonist.

The Lion may be safely attacked while sleeping, because of the dullness of his sense of hearing, the difficulty of awakening him, and his want of presence of mind if he be so awakened. Thus the Bushmen of Africa are enabled to keep the country tolerably clear of Lions, without encountering any great danger. The bone of the Lion's fore-leg is of remarkable hardness, from its containing a greater quantity of phosphate of lime than is found in ordinary bones, so that it may resist the powerful contraction of the muscles. The texture of this bone is so compact that the substance will strike fire with steel. He has little sense of taste, his lingual or tongue-nerve not being larger than that of a middle-sized dog.

The true Lions belong to the Old World exclusively, and they were formerly widely and abundantly diffused; but at present they are confined to Asia and Africa, and they are becoming every day more and more scarce in those quarters of the globe. That Lions were once found in Europe there can be no doubt. Thus it is recorded by Herodotus that the baggage-camels of the army of Xerxes were attacked by Lions in the country of the Reonians and the Crestonæi on their march from Acanthus (near the peninsula of Mount Athos) to Therma, afterwards Thessalonica (now Saloniki); the camels alone, it is stated, were attacked, other beasts remaining untouched, as well as men. Pausanias copies the above story, and states, moreover, that Lions often descended into the plains at the foot of Olympus, which separate Macedonia from Thessaly, and that Polydamas, a celebrated athlete, slew one of the Lions, although he was unarmed.

Nor is Europe the only part of the world from which the form of the Lion has disappeared. Lions are no longer to be found in Egypt, Palestine, or Syria, where they once were evidently far from uncommon. The frequent allusions to the Lion in the Holy Scriptures, and the various Hebrew terms there used to distinguish the different ages and sex of the animal, prove a familiarity with the habits of the race. Even in Asia generally, with the exception of some countries between India and Persia and some districts of Arabia, these magnificent beasts have, as Cuvier observes, become comparatively rare, and this is not to be wondered at. To say nothing of the immense draughts on the race for the Roman arena,--and they were not inconsiderable, for, as Zimmerman has shown, there were 1,000 lions killed at Rome in the space of forty years,--population and civilization have gradually driven them within narrower limits, and their destruction has been rapidly worked in modern times, when firearms have been used against them instead of the bow and the spear. Sylla gave a combat of one hundred Lions at once in his ædileship; but this exhibition is insignificant when compared with those of Pompey and Cæsar, the former of whom exhibited a fight of six hundred, and the latter of four hundred Lions. In Pompey's show three hundred and fifteen of the six hundred were males. The early Emperors consumed great numbers, frequently a hundred at a time, to gratify the people.

The African Lion is annually retiring before the persecution of man farther and farther from the Cape. Mr. Bennett says of the Lion:--"His true country is Africa, in the vast and untrodden wilds of which, from the immense deserts of the north to the trackless forests of the south, he reigns supreme and uncontrolled. In the sandy deserts of Arabia, in some of the wild districts of Persia, and in the vast jungles of Hindostan, he still maintains a precarious footing; but from the classic soil of Greece, as well as from the whole of Asia Minor, both of which were once exposed to his ravages, he has been entirely dislodged and extirpated."

Niebuhr places Lions among the animals of Arabia; but their proper country is Africa, where their size is the largest, their numbers are greatest, and their rage more tremendous, being inflamed by the influence of a burning sun upon a most arid soil. Dr. Fryer says that those of India are feeble and cowardly. In the interior parts, amidst the scorched and desolate deserts of Zaara or Biledugerid, they reign the masters; they lord it over every beast, and their courage never meets with a check where the climate keeps mankind at a distance. The nearer they approach the habitations of the human race the less their rage, or rather the greater is their timidity: they have often had experienced unequal combats, and finding that there exists a being superior to themselves, commit their ravages with more caution; a cooler climate, again, has the same effect, but in the burning deserts, where rivers and springs are denied, they live in a perpetual fever, a sort of madness fatal to every animal they meet with.

The watchfulness and tenacity of the Lion for human prey are very extraordinary. Mr. Barrow relates that a Lion once pursued a Hottentot from a pool of water, where he was driving his cattle to drink, to an olive-tree, in which the man remained for twenty-four hours, while the Lion laid himself at the foot of the tree. The patience of the beast was at length worn out by his desire to drink, and while he satisfied his thirst the Hottentot fled to his house, about a mile off. The Lion, however, returned to the tree, and tracked the man within three hundred yards of his dwelling.

Dr. Philip relates a horrible story of a very large Lion recorded at Cape Town in the year 1705. He was known to have seized a sentry at a tent, and was pursued and fired at by many persons without effect. Next morning the Lion walked up a hill _with the man in his mouth_, when about forty shots were fired at him without hitting him; and it was perceived by the blood, and a piece of the clothes of the sentry, that the Lion had taken him away and carried him with him. He was pursued by a band of Hottentots, one of whom he seized with his claws by the mantle, when the man stabbed him with an assagai. Other Hottentots adorned him with their assagais, so that he looked like a porcupine; he roared and leaped furiously, but was at length shot dead. He had a short time before carried off a Hottentot and devoured him.

The Bengal or Asiatic Lion is distinguished from that of Southern Africa principally by the larger size, the more regular and graceful form, the generally darker colour, and the less extensive mane than the African. William Harvey, the graceful artist, drew a portrait of a very fine Bengal Lion, little more than five years old, and then in the Tower collection, and called by the keepers "the Old Lion;" the magnificent development of the mane is very striking in this figure.

Maneless Lions have been found on the confines of Arabia, and were known to Aristotle and Pliny; a maneless Lion is also said to be represented on the monuments of Upper Egypt. The Lion of Arabia has neither the courage nor the stature, nor even the beauty, of the Lion of Africa. He uses cunning rather than force; he crouches among the reeds which border the Tigris and Euphrates, and springs upon all the feeble animals which come there to quench their thirst; but he dares not attack the boar, which is very common there, and flies as soon as he perceives a man, a woman, or even a child. If he catches a sheep he makes off with his prey; but he abandons it to save himself when an Arab looks after him. If he is hunted by horsemen, which often happens, he does not defend himself unless he is wounded, and has no hope of safety by flight. In such a case he will fly on a man and tear him to pieces with his claws, for it is courage more than strength that he wants. Achmed, Pasha of Bagdad from 1724 to 1747, would have been torn by one, after breaking his lance in a hunt, if his slave Suleiman, who succeeded him in the Pashalik, had not come promptly to his succour and pierced with a blow of his yataghan the Lion already wounded by his master.

In December, 1833, Captain Walter Smee exhibited to the Zoological Society of London the skins of a Lion and Lioness killed by him in Guzerat, and distinguished from those previously known by the absence of a mane; the tail was shorter than that of the ordinary Lion, and furnished at its tip with a much larger brush or tuft; and in the tuft of the older Lion was a short horny claw or nail. The colour is fulvous; which in darker specimens has a tinge of red. A male maneless Lion, killed by Captain Smee, measured, including the tail, 8 feet 9-1/2 inches in length; the impression of his paw on the sand 6-1/4 inches across, and his height was 3 feet 6 inches. These maneless Lions are found in Guzerat, along the banks of the Sombermultee, in low, bushy-wooded plains, being driven out of the large adjoining tracts of high grass jungle by the natives annually setting fire to the grass. Here Captain Smee killed his finest specimens: they were so common in this district that he killed no fewer than eleven during a residence of about a month, yet scarcely any of the natives had seen them previously to his coming amongst them. The cattle were frequently carried off by these Lions: some natives attributed this to tigers, which, however, do not exist in this part of the country. Captain Smee could not learn that men had been attacked by these Lions: when struck by a ball they exhibited great boldness, standing as if preparing to resist their pursuers, and then going off slowly, and in a very sullen manner.

In captivity the Lioness usually turns extremely savage when she becomes a mother; and, in a state of nature, both parents guard their young with the greatest jealousy. Early in the year 1823 General Watson, then on service in Bengal, being out one morning on horseback, armed with a double-barrelled rifle, was suddenly surprised by a large male Lion, which bounded out upon him from the thick jungle, at the distance of only a few yards. He instantly fired, and the shot taking complete effect, the animal fell almost dead at his feet. No sooner had the Lion fallen than the Lioness rushed out, which the General also shot at and wounded severely, so that she retired into the thicket. Thinking that the den could not be far distant, he traced her to her retreat, and there despatched her; and in the den were found two beautiful cubs, a male and a female, apparently not more than three months old. This is a very touching narrative, even of the Lion family.

The General brought the cubs away; they were suckled by a goat and sent to England, where they arrived in September, 1823, as a present to George IV., and were lodged in the Tower. When young, Lions mew like a cat; at the age of ten or twelve months the mane begins to appear in the male; at the age of eighteen months this appendage is considerably developed, and they begin to roar. The _roar_ of the adult Lion is terrific, from the larynx or upper part of the wind-pipe being proportionately greater than in the whale or the elephant, or any other animal. Mr. Burchell describes the roar on some occasions to resemble the noise of an earthquake; and this terrific effect is produced by the Lion laying his head upon the ground and uttering, as it were, a half-stifled roar or growl, which is conveyed along the earth.

The natural period of the Lion's life is generally supposed to be twenty or twenty-two years. Such is Buffon's limitation; but the animal will, it seems, live much longer. Pompey, the great Lion, which died in 1766, was said to have been in the Tower above seventy years; and a Lion from the river Gambia is stated to have since died in the Tower menagerie at the age of sixty-three.

There had been for ages a popular belief that the Lion lashes his sides with his tail to stimulate himself into rage; when, in 1832, there was exhibited to the Zoological Society a claw obtained from the tip of the tail of a Barbary Lion, presented to the Society's menagerie by Sir Thomas Reade. It was detected on the living animal by Mr. Bennett, and pointed out to the keeper, in whose hands it came off while he was examining it. Blumenbach quotes Homer, Lucan, and Pliny, among others who have described the Lion (erroneously) as lashing himself with his tail, when angry, to provoke his rage. None of these writers, however, advert to any peculiarity in the Lion's tail to which so extraordinary a function might, however incorrectly, be attributed. Didymus Alexandrinus, a commentator on the "Iliad," cited by Blumenbach, having found a black prickle, like a horn, among the hair of the tail, immediately conjectured that he had ascertained the true cause of the stimulus when the animal flourishes his tail in defiance of his enemies, remarking that, when punctured by this prickle, the Lion became more irritable from the pain which it occasioned. The subject, however, appears to have slumbered till 1829, when M. Deshayes announced that he had found the prickle both of a Lion and Lioness, which had died in the French menagerie, and described it as a little nail, or horny production, adhering by its base only to the skin, and not to the last caudal vertebra. From that period Mr. Wood, the able zoologist, examined the tail of every Lion, living or dead, to which he could gain access; but in no instance had he succeeded in finding the prickle till the above specimen, which was placed in his hands within half an hour after its removal from the living animal, and while yet soft at its base, where it had been attached to the skin. Its shape was nearly straight, then slightly contracted, forming a very obtuse angle, and afterwards swelling out like the bulb of a bristle, to its termination. It was laterally flattened throughout its entire length, which did not amount to quite three-eighths of an inch, of horn colour, and nearly black at the tip. Its connexion with the skin must have been very slight, which accounts for its usual absence in stuffed as well as living specimens. This does not depend upon age, as it was found alike in the Paris Lions, of considerable size, as well as in the Zoological Society's Lions, very small and young; nor did it depend upon sex. It appears to be occasionally present in the Leopard; and, in both Lion and Leopard, it is seated at the extreme tip of the tail, and is altogether unconnected with the terminal caudal vertebra; not fitted on like a cap, but rather inserted into the skin.

The use of the prickle, however, it still remained difficult to conjecture; but that its existence was known to the ancients is proved by the Nimroud sculptures in the British Museum, in an exaggerated representation of the claw, in support of this curious fact in natural history. The existence of the claw has been proved by Mr. Bennett; and "it is no small gratification to be able now to quote in evidence of the statement of Mr. Bennett, and of his predecessor. Didymus, of Alexandria, the original and authentic document, on the authority of the veritable descendants of the renowned hunter Nimroud; which any one may read who will take the trouble to examine the sculptured slab in the British Museum."[8]

In the Nineveh galleries of the British Museum we also see pictured in stone the employment of the Lion, in the life of Assyria and Babylonia, three thousand years since; in the events of a succession of dynasties, recording the sieges of cities, the combats of warriors, the triumphs of Kings, the processions of victors, the chains and fetters of the vanquished. To the zoological observer these sculptures present drawings _ad naturam_ of tableaux of Lions and Lion-hunts; Lions in combat, as well as in moveable dens and cages, and the ferocity of the chase; and Lions transfixed with arrows or javelins in the arena. One of the finest of these sculptures is in the representation of a Lion-hunt, on a long slab that lined the principal chamber of the most ancient palace at Nimroud. The King is in his chariot, drawn by three horses, which the charioteer is urging forward to escape the attack of an infuriated Lion that has already placed its fore-paws upon the back of the chariot. At this critical moment, the Royal descendant of the mighty hunter aims a deadly shaft at the head of the roaring and wounded Lion, the position of whose tail and limbs is finely indicative of rage and fury. Behind the Lion are two of the King's attendants, fully armed, and holding their daggers and shields, ready to defend themselves in case the prey should escape the arrow of the King. Before the chariot is a wounded Lion, crawling from under the horses' feet. The cringing agony conveyed in its entire action is well contrasted with the undaunted fury of the former. In another slab we have the continuation of the same Lion-hunt, representing the triumphant return of the King from the chase. At his feet lies the Lion subdued, but not dead.

Of the pageantry of the Lion, we read, in Bell's "Travels," that the monarch of Persia had, on days of audience, two great Lions chained on each side of the passage to the state-room, led there by keepers in golden chains.

Our early English Sovereigns had a menagerie in the Tower from the reign of Henry III. (1252.) In 1370 (44 Edward III.) are entries of payments made to "the Keeper of the King's Lions and Leopards" there, at the rate of 6_d._ a-day for his wages, and 6_d._ a-day for each beast. The number of beasts varied from four to seven. Two young Lions are specially mentioned; and "a Lion lately sent by the Lord the Prince, from Germany to England, to our Lord the King." And we read, in Lord Burghley's "Diary," 1586, of the grant of the keeping of the Lions in the Tower, with "the Fine of 12_d._ per diem, and 6_d._ for the Meat of those Lions." The first menagerie-building was the Lion Tower, to which was added a semicircular inclosure, where Lions and Bears were baited with dogs, with which James I. and his court were much delighted. A Lion was named after the reigning King; and it was popularly believed that "when the King dies, the Lion of that name dies after him." The last of the Tower animals were transferred to the Zoological Society's menagerie, in the Regent's-park, in 1834. The Tower menagerie is well described in a handsome volume, with woodcut portraits, by William Harvey.

The punishment of being _thrown to Lions_ is stated as common among the Romans of the first century; and numerous tales are extant, in which the fierce animals became meek and lamb-like before the holy virgins of the Church. This, indeed, is the origin of the superstition, nowhere more beautifully expressed than in Lord Byron's "Siege of Corinth":--

"'Tis said that a Lion will turn and flee
From a maid in the pride of her purity."

Every wild beast show almost has its tame Lion, with which the keeper takes the greatest liberties; liberties which the beast will suffer, generally speaking, from none but him. Major Smith relates that he had seen the keeper of a Lioness stand upon the beast, drag her round the cage by her tail, open her jaws, and thrust his head between her teeth. Another keeper, at New York, had provided himself with a fur cap, the novelty of which attracted the notice of the Lion, which, making a sudden grapple, tore the cap off his head as he passed the cage; but, perceiving that the keeper was the person whose head he had thus uncovered, he immediately laid the cap down. Wombwell, in his menagerie, had a fine Lion, Nero, that allowed _strangers_ to enter his den, and even put their heads within his jaws. This tameness is not, however, to be trusted, since the natural ferocity of some Lions is never safely subdued. Lions which have been sometimes familiar, have, on other occasions, been known to kill their keepers, and dart at those who have incautiously approached too near their cage. All these exhibitions have been entirely eclipsed by the feats of Van Amburgh, in his exercise of complete control over Lions. The melancholy fate of "the Lion Queen," however, tells of the fatal result of her confidence. The Lion-killing feats of Captain Gordon Cumming had a more legitimate object in view--to render us more familiar with the zoological character of the Lion.

Colonization has scarcely yet extirpated the Lion in Algeria, where the French colonists make fine sport of "the King of the Beasts." M. Jules Gerard, a Nimroud in his way, has been noted for his Lion-killing feats. We read of his tracking a large old Lion in the Smauls country, one hundred leagues in ten days, without catching a glimpse of anything but his foot-prints. At length, accompanied by a native of the country and a spahi, Gerard took up his quarters at the foot of a tree upon the path which the old Lion had taken. It was moonlight, and Gerard made out two Lions sitting about one hundred paces off, and exactly in the shadow of the tree. The Arab lay snoring ten paces off, in the full light of the moon, and had, doubtless, attracted the attention of the Lions. Gerard expressly forbade the spahi to wake the Arab. Our Lion-hunter then got up the hill to reconnoitre; the boldest of the Lions came up to within ten paces of Gerard, and fifteen of the Arab: the Lion's eye was fixed on the latter, and the second Lion placed himself on a level with, and four or five paces from, the first. They proved to be both full-grown Lionesses. Gerard took aim at the first as she came rolling and roaring down to the foot of the tree. The Arab was scarcely awakened, when a second ball stretched the Lioness dead upon the spot. Gerard then looked out for the second Lioness, who was standing up within fifteen paces, looking around her. He fired, and she fell down roaring, and disappeared in a field of maize; she fell, but was still alive. Next morning at daybreak, at the spot where the Lioness had fallen, were blood marks, denoting her track in the direction of a wood. After sending off the dead Lioness. Gerard returned to his post of the preceding night. A little after sunset the Lion roared in his lair, and continued roaring all night. Convinced that the wounded Lioness was there, Gerard sent two Arabs to explore the cover, but they durst not. He next evening reached the lair, taking with him a goat, which he left with the Arabs: the Lioness appeared. Gerard fired, and she fell without a struggle; she was believed dead, but she got up again as though nothing was the matter, and showed all her teeth. One of the Arabs, within six paces of her, seeing her get up, clung to the lower branches of a tree and disappeared like a squirrel. The Lioness fell dead at the foot of the tree, a second bullet piercing her heart: the first had passed out of the nape of the neck without breaking the skull-bone.

The Lions presented by Lord Prudhoe to the British Museum are the best sculptured representations of the animal in this country. Although the Lion is our national hieroglyphic, and there are many statues of him, yet not one among them all appears without a defect, which makes our representations of him belong to the class _canis_ instead of _felis_, a fault not found in any Egyptian sculpture.[9]

FOOTNOTES:

[8] Bonomi; "Nineveh and its Palaces," p. 249.

[9] Bonomi; "Proc. Royal Soc., Literature."

BIRD-LIFE.

"Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they
reap, nor gather into barns; yet your Heavenly Father feedeth
them."--Matthew vi. 26.

"Free tenants of land, air, and ocean,
Their forms all symmetry, their motions grace;
In plumage delicate and beautiful,
Thick without burthen, close as fishes' scales,
Or loose as full-blown poppies on the gales;
With wings that seem as they'd a soul within them,
They bear their owners with such sweet enchantment."

_James Montgomery._

Birds, as regards structure, are perhaps the most perfectly endowed, as they are certainly the most beautiful and interesting, of all the lower animals. In Birds there is an admirable mechanism and adaptation both for gliding in the air and swimming in the water. They surpass all other animals in the faculty of continuing their motion without resting, as well as in its rapidity. The fleetest courser can scarcely ever run more than a mile in a minute, nor support that speed beyond five or six such exertions. But the joyous Swallow does this tenfold for pleasure. In his usual way he flies at the rate of one mile in a minute; and Wilson, the ornithologist, ascertained that the Swallow is so engaged for ten hours every day. So can the Blue-bird of America, for a space of 600 miles. Our Carrier-pigeons move with half that celerity: one flew from Liskeard to London, 220 miles, in six hours. The Golden Eagle is supposed to dart through the fiercest storm at the rate of 160 miles an hour; but one of our smallest Birds, the Swift, can even quadruple the most excited quickness of the race-horse for a distance. Spallanzani thought that the little Swift travelled at the rate of 250 miles an hour.

Inquiries into the phenomena of the flight of Birds would lead us far beyond our limits. The subject is beset with error. Thus, we read:--"Every one has remarked the manner in which Birds of prey float, as it were, without any effort, and with steady expanded wings, at great heights in the atmosphere. This they are enabled to do from the quantity of air contained in the air-cells of their bodies, which air being taken in at a low level in the atmosphere, of course rarefies and expands as the Bird ascends into higher regions. Their rapidity of descent must be accomplished by the sudden expulsion of this air, aided by their muscular efforts."

Now, Dr. Crisp has read to the Zoological Society a paper "On the Presence or Absence of Air in the Bones of Birds," for the purpose of showing the prevailing error upon the subject--viz., "that the bones of the Bird are filled with air." Of fifty-two British Birds recently dissected by him, only one, the Sparrow-hawk, had the bones generally perforated for the admission of air. In thirteen others, the humeri only were hollow, and among these were several Birds of short flight. In the remaining thirty-eight, neither the _humeri_ nor _femora_ contained air, although in this list were several Birds of passage and of rapid flight--Dr. Crisp's conclusion being, that the majority of British Birds have no air in their bones, and that, with the exception of the Falcons, but very few British Birds have hollow femora.

Mr. Gould records a most remarkable instance of rapid and sustained flight, which he witnessed on his return from North America, whither he had proceeded for the purpose of studying the habits and manners of the species of _Trochilus_ (Humming Bird), frequenting that portion of America. Having remarked that he arrived just prior to the period of the migration of this Bird from Mexico to the north, and had ample opportunities for observing it in a state of nature, he noticed that its actions were very peculiar, and quite different from those of all other birds: the flight is performed by a motion of the wings so rapid as to be almost imperceptible; indeed, the muscular power of this little creature appears to be very great in every respect, as, independently of its rapid and sustained flight, it grasps the small twigs, flowers, &c., upon which it alights with the utmost tenacity. It appears to be most active in the morning and evening, and to pass the middle of the day in a state of sleepy torpor. Occasionally it occurs in such numbers that fifty or sixty birds may be seen in a single tree. When captured it so speedily becomes tame that it will feed from the hand or mouth within half an hour. Mr. Gould having been successful in keeping a Humming-Bird alive in a gauze bag attached to his breast button for three days, during which it readily fed from a bottle filled with a syrup of brown sugar and water, he determined to make an attempt to bring some living examples to England, in which he succeeded; but unfortunately they did not long survive their arrival.