108 NINTH ANNUAL REPORT OF 



in the desert ; and every vegetable zone is found to furnish some plant 

 specially suited to his nutriment, while, in case of necessity, he scarcely 

 refuses any green thing.* His powerful jaws and teeth enable him to 

 grind and masticate branches of the hardest wood as thick as the linger. 

 His palate is lined with a very hard cartilage ; and the inside of the hp, 

 the tongue, and the gums are protected by a skin almost equall}^ im- 

 penetrable. The lips are, nevertheless, very flexible, and the upper 

 iabrum is divided. In feeding on the acacia or other'^prickly plants, 

 he retracts and partiall}^ inverts the lips, grasps the twigs with the 

 tongue and jaws, and tlms crops and chews the thorniest shrubs with 

 impunity. 



The camels domesticated in Tuscany, which, though degenerated . 

 by a residence of centuries in the moist climate and alluvial soil of the 

 lower Arno, are of the Arabian stock, neglect the green and tender 

 cultivated grasses, but devour with avidity the leaves and smaller 

 branches of the oak and the alder, and the hard dry stems of the thorn, 

 the thistle, and the broom. The working camels at the grand duke's 

 farm, near Pisa, are sheltered and fed on hay during the winter, but 

 the rest of the herd remain in the open air, and subsist on twigs and 

 withered shrubs, through the cold season. 



The Bactrian camel has the same fondness for saline plants as his 

 African congener; but he feeds also upon the leaves, twigs, and bark 

 of deciduous trees, the coarsest grasses, thistles, reeds, rushes, weeds, 

 straw, and, in short, u]:)on such vegetable diet as is rejected by almost 

 every other domestic quadruped. 



The statements of travellers difTer very considerably in regard to the 

 quantity of solid li)od required by the camel. My own observation 

 would lead me to think it extremely small. As I have already stated, 

 he is usually not fed at all; and in travelling his only opportunity of 

 gathering his food is between the evening halt and sunset, when he 

 returns to the camp, with such scattering mouthfuls as he can snatch 

 upon the march. The vegetation of the desert is usually so sparse that 

 the quantity of nutritious food which can be collected after the day's 

 journey is performed must be very inconsiderable ; and though upon 

 starting in the morning the animal shows signs of hunger, and much 

 annoys his rider by suddenly stopping or starting aside to crop a 

 temjning thorn twig or thistle, yet in an hour or two his appetite is 

 satislied, and he performs the rest of his task without seeming to crave 

 food. I was assured by the keeper of the herd at Pisa, that when fed 

 entirely on hay, the camel consumed little more than half as much as 

 the horse; while, on the other hand, a correspondent in the Crimea 

 inf()rms me that the Bactrian camel requires at least fifty pounds ofhay 

 per day in waiter, and another in Bessarabia estimates the daily winter 

 supply ofhay and straw at seventy pounds. Pattenger states that the 

 camels in Beloochistan receive about fifteen pounds of meal daily, be- 

 sides grass and shrubs, and he adds the singular fact that the Belooches 

 give these animals considerable quantities of opium with their food; 

 but most travellers state that when fed at all, the camel receives five 



*Carbuccia, page 10, says that the camel never touches the " aloe ; " but an othcial report, 

 at page 182 of the same volume, enumerates the "cactus" among the wild vegetables con- 

 sumed by him. 



