Black Rhinoceros at Samarinja
signed in pencil 'T Baines' (lower right), inscribed 'Black Rhinocerus (6 feet at the shoulder) Shangani Matebili shot by myself at Samarinja between Sebaque and Bembesi Rivers Thursday Oct 6 1870'
watercolour and pencil
27.5 x 38cm (10 13/16 x 14 15/16in).

Footnotes

Provenance
The collection of Eduard Mohr (1828-1876);
The collection of Major Aubrey Hilton of Harare;
Acquired by a private collector circa 1970;
By descent.

This coloured drawing is extensively documented in Baines's diary of his first journey to the Northern Goldfields (1870-71). His party had crossed the Sebaque River when the men "called out Inkhombo - a rhinoceros". Baines shot him in the ribs, then the hind leg. His men attacked with assegais. More shots were fired and the animal was finished off with spears. Baines notes, "I made two sketches and, having no one who cared how long I detained him, I made a copious set of measurements".

They are very detailed as is his written description. He comments on colours, skin reticulation and wrinkles, and differences between the black and white rhinoceros. Baines's close scrutiny suggests that he subsequently made good use of his notes and sketches in oil paintings such as The Black Rhinoceros (1874), one of the works commissioned by Guy Dawnay (Sanlam Art Collection).

Unusually for this period, Baines was not a keen hunter and observed in his journal, "I confess I can never quite get over the feeling that the wonderful products of nature are objects to be admired, rather than destroyed."

Bibliography
Wallis, J. P. R. (Ed .). The Northern Goldfields Diaries of Thomas Baines. First Journey 1870-71, vol. 2. London: Chatto and Windus, 1946.

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