text: The hippopotamus is the third largest land animal ( after the elephant and the white rhinoceros ) and the heaviest extant artiodactyl , despite being considerably shorter than the giraffe .
simplified: The hippopotamus is the third largest land animal ( the elephant is the largest , and the white rhinoceros is the second largest ) . It is also the heaviest artiodactyl , even though it is much shorter than the giraffe .