THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 109 



or six pounds of meal at most. The power of the camel to abstain 

 Irom water is much more iVequently and severely tested than his ability 

 to dispense with food. The testimony of travellers, as well as of na- 

 tive observers on this subject varies widely ; but their discrepancies 

 can generally be explained by difference of breed, of season, or the 

 greater or less succulence of the solid food consumed by the animal. 



The most extraordinary statements I have seen are those of the 

 ollicial reports of the French officers attached to the dromedary corps 

 in Algeria. One of these reports declares that the camels of tlje corps 

 employed in the expedition of El Aghouat did not drink from Feb- 

 ruary to May, though the weather was very hot; and General Carbuc- 

 cia, tlie commander of the corps, positively states that the Algerine 

 camel under no circumstances drinks oftener than once in seven days.* 

 Although many travellers have related cases of very long privation, 

 while the animal had daily access to an aljundant supph' of green suc- 

 culent food, 3^et that excellent observer Russell mentions an instance 

 of fifteen days abstinence as altogether unprecedented ; and 1 have 

 been able to find but one other well authenticated case, which is 

 tiKit mentioned by Denham and Clapperton,t of so long an abstinence 

 as eight days, when the animal fed mostly on dry food. Most travel- 

 lers concur in saying that under such circumstances the extreme limit 

 of endurance of the Arabian camel, whose powers in that respect are 

 much greater than those of the Bactrlan or other northern breeds, does 

 not exceed five or six days. The longest period of coniplete privation 

 I have pei'sonally witnessed was lour days in very hot weatlier, and 

 u])on withered fodder ; and I have always observed that the camel 

 drank as often as he had an opportunity. In most countries where the 

 animal is used, it is said he can dispense with drinking twice as long as 

 the horse under the same circumstances. This I doubt not is a very near 

 general approximation to the truth.| These facts, however wonderful, are 

 by no means so extraordinary or incredible as they may at first sight ap- 

 pear. The domestic ox, when supplied with abundance of green fodder, 

 seldom inclines to drink. Persons familiar with sheep husbandry 

 know that in rich pastures that animal thrives very well for many 

 weeks in the hottest summers, without any water but that which falls 

 in the shape of dew; and if I mistake not. Captain Stansbury's mules 

 travelled two whole days along the margin of Salt Lake, without food 

 or water. 



It is not the mere power of abstinence alone that so eminently fits 

 the camel for traveUing the steppe and the desert. His preference for 

 the brackish and even saline waters which almost exclusively occur in 

 those regions, and which are often so highly impregnated with mineral 

 substances as to be rejected by most other quadrupeds, is a property 

 almost as valuable. Russell even states that he prefers sea-water to 



*Carbuccia, 10, 11,89,204. 



t Denham and Clapperton, I. c. 3. 



|Tiie quantity of v\'ater swallowed by the camel, afler long privation, is very great. I 

 have seen one empty at a draught three goat skins, holding not less tlian seven gallons each ; 

 and Riley speaks of even much greater quantities. The camel smells, or by some other 

 sense detects water at the distance of a mile or more ; and the uncontrolled violence with 

 which he rushes to the well to satisfy his thirst is one of the greatest inconveniences, not to 

 say dangers, of desert travel. 



