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Now, I suppose, you are wondering what sort of animal-baby Chunky was. In the first place he was quite large—as large as the largest fat pig on your grandfather’s farm. And Chunky really looked a little like a pig, except that his nose was broad and square instead of pointed.

Chunky was a hippopotamus, as perhaps you have guessed. But, as hippopotamus is quite a long and hard word for little boys and girls to remember, I will first tell you what it means, and then I will make it short for you, so you will have no hard work at all to remember it, or say it.

Hippopotamus means “river-horse”; and a great many years ago when people first saw the queer animals swimming in the African rivers, they thought they were horses that liked to be in the water instead of on land. So that is how the hippopotamus got its name of river horse. But we’ll call them hippos for short, and it will do just as well.

Chunky was called the happy hippo. And he was very happy. In fact when he opened his big mouth to swallow grass and river weeds you might have thought he was laughing.