Page:Lake Ngami.djvu/384

376 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.



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: