MAMMALIA — CAMEL. 325 



to bear not only the weight of their body, but also the burdens with which 

 they are laden. These poor animals must suffer a great deal, as they make 

 lamentable cries, especially when they are overloaded ; and, notwithstand- 

 ing they are continually abused, they have as much spirit as docility. At 

 the first sign they bend their legs under their bodies, and kneeling upon the 

 ground, they are loaded, without the trouble of lifting the load a great 

 height, which must happen, were they to stand upright. As soon as they 

 are loaded, they raise themselves up again without any assistance or sup- 

 port ; and the conductor, mounted on one of them, precedes the whole troop, 

 who follow him at the same pace as he leads. They have need of neither 

 whip or spur, to excite them ; but, when they begin to be fatigued, their 

 conductors support their spirits, or rather charm their weariness, by a song, 

 or the sound of some instrument. When they want to prolong the route, 

 or double the day's journey, they give them an hour's rest ; after which, 

 renewing their song, they again proceed on their way for many hours more; 

 and the singing continues until they stop. Then the camels again kneel 

 down on the earth, to be relieved from the burden. They remain in this 

 cramped posture, with their belly crouched upon the earth, and sleep in the 

 midst of their baggage, which is tied on again the next morning, with as 

 much readiness and facility as it was untied before they went to rest. 



They have a great plenty of milk, which is thick, and nourishing even 

 for tne human species, if it is mixed with more than an equal quantity of 

 water. The females seldom do any labor while they are with young, but 

 are suffered to bring forth at liberty. The profit which arises from their 

 produce, and from their milk, perhaps surpasses that which is got from their 

 labor. In general, the fatter the camels are, the more capable they are 

 of enduring great fatigues. Their hunches appear to be formed only from 

 the superabundance of nourishment ; for, in long journeys, where they are 

 obliged to stint them in their food, and where they suffer both hunger and 

 thirst, these hunches gradually diminish, and are reduced almost even, and 

 the eminences are only discovered by the height of the hair, which is always 

 much longer upon these parts than upon any other part of the back. 



The young camel sucks its mother a year ; and when they want to bring 

 him up so as to make him strong and robust, they leave him at liberty to 

 suck or graze for a longer time, nor begin to load him, or put him to labor, 

 till he has attained the age of four years. The camel commonly lives forty 

 or fifty years. 



The camel is not only of greater value than the elephant, but perhaps 

 not of less than the horse, the ass, and the ox, all united together. He 

 alone carries as much as two mules. He not only eats less, but likewise 

 feeds on herbs as coarse as the ass. The female furnishes milk a longer 

 time than the cow. The flesh of the young camels is good and wholesome, 

 like veal ; their hair is finer, and more sought after than the finest wool ; 

 there is not a part of them, even to their excrements, from which some 



