2-888-705 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Hippopotamus in the Gardens of the Zoological Society, Regent's-Park, [London], 1850. Obaysch, a gift of Abbas Pasha, was the first hippopotamus seen in Great Britain since prehistoric times, and the first in Europe since Ancient Rome. He was captured on an island on the White Nile when he was less than one year old. His name is derived from the name of the island. 'To see the Hippopotamus rightly, is to see him in the water: there his activity is only surpassed by the otter or the seal; and fortunate is the spectator who obtains his first impression of the creature as he emerges suddenly above the surface, after diving or lying tranquilly at the bottom of the tank, which occupies a large portion of the house in which he is exhibited. The beautiful adaptation of structure to peculiar habits is in no animal more beautifully conspicuous than in the Hippopotamus'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.