42 THE WANDERINGS OF ANIMALS [CH. 



long, balancing tail, often with a tassel of long 

 hair. 



Water being scarce in deserts the inhabitants 

 eke out the deficiency by the dew, or they are forced 

 to wander far and wide in search of scanty pools. 

 Various ruminants have developed an astonishing 

 power of enduring long intervals between drinks. In 

 Mexico and Arizona, for instance, and around the 

 Indian desert the cattle can sometimes return to the 

 drinking places only every other, or even every third 

 day, because the scanty pasture obliges them to roam 

 so far afield. We all know of the unique water- 

 storing arrangement of the camel's stomach which 

 enables these animals to subsist for well-nigh a week 

 upon the thorniest and driest of food without a drink. 

 But the most universal feature of nearly all desert 

 animals is their coloration, be they birds, beasts or 

 creeping things. They all are of the colour of the 

 desert, shades of yellow, light brown, reddish, sandy ; 

 often very pretty in delicate detail, with wonderful, 

 small patterns. Black, white, blue and green are 

 absent. Many of these animals are monochrome ; 

 stripes are absent. If the ground-lizards are not 

 monochrome, uniform in colour, the runners among 

 them have a pale ground-colour with dark spots. 

 The harmony between deserts and their inhabitants 

 is striking. Every animal has those colours and that 

 patteni stamped upon its dress which make up the 



