Exotica on the Block

If you've had your heart set on a squarelipped rhinoceros for office decor or a matching set of 200-million-year-old dinosaur tracks to scare off the overbibulous guest, you've lost your chance.

These items — and a number of equally exotic finds — came under the auctioneer's hammer one August Saturday at Hanover's new Montshire Museum. Former inhabitants of the College Museum, reputedly part of the second oldest such collection in the country, they were given earlier this year to the Lyme Road museum to make room for expanded college collections in archeology and ethnology. The Montshire Museum decided to auction off duplicates and other specimens not germane to its concentration on New England plant and animal life.

Shortly before the sale, a network television show devoted a few minutes to the collection, videotaping the segment in a Boston studio. We've heard of no fatalities, but there were some near misses on Interstate 93 as unwary motorists spotted the rhino and an ostrich staring out of a jeep and the bear, dingo, mandril, hyrax, and baboon lined up in a station wagon in convoy.

A little body English — or French — augmented words when host families of Dartmouth students on study terms in Francevisited Hanover in August. Most went onto see their American "sons and daughters" and their parents across the country.