FURTHER NOTES ON THE HIPPOPOTAMUS

The following remarks are supplementary to a note on the hippopotamus in Vol. ii, p. 35. In that note the exhibition of the hippopotamus at the Roman games is not traced lower than the time of the Emperor Commodus. Helagabalus, however, 218-22 A.D., had hippopotami among the various rare animals which he displayed in public as a part of his state. (Lamprid. c. 28) A hippopotamus was likewise in the vast collection of animals which were prepared for the Persian triumph of Gordian III., but were exhibited at the secular games celebrated by the Emperor Philip in the 1000th year of Rome, 248 A.D.…