Although formerly ranging a considerable way down the peninsula, the great Indian rhinoceros, as this species should properly be called, is more or less completely restricted to Nepal and the country east of the Tista valley, especially the plain of Assam and Kuch-Behar. Here the mighty beast, which stands over 5½ feet in height at the shoulder, dwells in the tall grass-jungles, where it is as completely concealed as is a rabbit in a meadow ready for mowing. The rhinoceroses, in fact, make for themselves in this giant grass, tunnels, or “runs,” in which they move from place to place perfectly secure from observation, and likewise protected from the direct rays of the sun; and it appears that, except to drink, they seldom leave this wonderful covert. To attempt to shoot such enormous beasts on foot in jungle of this description, where escape from the beaten track is well-nigh impossible, would be little short of madness; and the Indian rhinoceros is therefore always hunted on elephants. In old books on Indian sports the rhinoceros is depicted as charging the elephants, and attempting to spear them with its horn, if not in the act of goring their bodies. This is, however, erroneous, as none of the three named species of Asiatic rhinoceros use their horns in this manner, but employ for offence their sharp, triangular lower tusks, with which they make lateral thrusts and lunges after the manner of a wild boar. African rhinoceroses, on the other hand, have no tusks, and consequently have to rely on their horns--always two in number--for both attack and defence. It must not, however, be assumed from this that the absence of tusks is compensated by the development of two horns, for there is one Asiatic species, commonly known as the Sumatran rhinoceros (_Rhinoceros sumatrensis_), which has two horns combined with lower tusks; this species thus being the most formidably armed member of the whole group. This so-called Sumatran rhinoceros also occurs in some of the eastern districts of India, as does likewise the third Asiatic species, commonly known as the Javan rhinoceros (_R. sondaicus_), which resembles the great Indian species in carrying but one horn. [Illustration]