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.