THE PETER PAN HIPPO

Evening Star, Issue 19666, 20 September 1927, Page 4

THE PETER PAN HIPPO

WILL NOT LEAVE HIS MOTHER A quarter of a lon of young hippopotamus is nearly ready to loavo his mother at the London Zoo, but there arc all kinds of problems to bo solved before tho infant can be weaned (declares the ‘ Weekly Dispatch ’). Jimmy, (he baby, is already cutting his tusks—a very critical business with those young monsters—and cals quite well, but he still turns to Joan, his mother, for part of his rations. As ho is .ten*months old, it is quite- lirac he were put into knickerbockers, as it were. Besides, there is the gross injustice to Bobbie, his father, who lias now been cut off from his family for over a year. Bobbie’s efforts to rejoin his mate have made it necessary for tho barrier between them to he strengthened with timber and sheet steel on three different occasions. After the long parting there is almost certain to be a battle of giants when Joan and Bobbie are reunited, but these domestic, squabbles seldom load to serious injuries. After a few flesh wounds and they like each oilier better than ever. But tho child stands between them. He has no homo where lie can spend his boyhood, since tho second warmed pool in the Zoo is already split into two so that a jjair of pigmy hippos can be kept apart for The same reason ns that which led to the separation of Bobbie and Joan. It does thescUgiant youngsters no good when they aro kept too long at their mother’s apron strings. There is tho historic case of “ The Dodger,” a young American bison, who stayed with his mother until he was two years old. He then weighed about a ton, and' his mother was less than half his weight. It took about twenty unsentimental, perspiring keepers, with a Gin rope, to wean “ The Dodger.”