There are several species of the Rhinoceros, some of which have one
horn, like a Unicorn, others two, like a Dilemma. All the varieties are
as strictly vegetarian as the late SYLVESTER GRAHAM, but their fondness
for a botanic diet may be ascribed to instinct, rather than reflection,
as they are not ruminating animals. The most formidable of the tribe is
the Black Rhinoceros of Equatorial Africa, which is particularly
dangerous when it turns to Bay. Though dull of eye and ear, this
ponderous beast will follow a scent with wonderful tenacity, and the
promptness with which it makes its tremendous charges has earned for it,
among European hunters, the sobriquet of the "Ready Rhino." The fact
that the Black Rhinoceros is armed with two horns, while most of the
white species have but one, may perhaps account for the greater
viciousness of the former--it being generally admitted that the most
ferocious of all known monsters are those which have been furnished with
a plurality of horns. This is the position taken by the famous New
England naturalist, NEAL DOW, in his dissertations on that destructive
Eastern pachyderm, the Striped Pig, and it seems to be fully borne out
by the history of the great Scriptural Decicorn, as given by the
inspired Zoologist, ST. JOHN.

We learn from Sir SAMUEL BAKER and other Nimrods of the Ramrod who have
hunted up the Nile, that herds of the Black Rhinoceros are pretty
thickly sprinkled throughout the whole extent of the Nilotic basin, and
especially near the great watershed which forms the primary source of
the mysterious river. The natives of that region universally regard the
creature as a Rum customer, and not having the requisite Spirit to face
it boldly, they set Gins under the Tope trees, at the places where it
comes to drink, and thus effect its destruction.