DIET, AND POWEES OF ABSTINENCE. 91 



Burckhardt^ states that the camel of Asia 

 Minor, which seldom drinks in winter, requires 

 water every other day in summer, and if longer 

 deprived of it frequently dies on the third. 

 The Nedjd camel will often die if not watered 

 by the evening of the fourth day, and he de- 

 clares that in Arabia the utmost limit of absti- 

 nence in summer is four, or possibly in some 

 cases five days, though the animal shows signs 

 of great distress after the third. The camel of 

 Nubia and the Sahara has much greater powers 

 of endurance in this respect. Denham and 

 Clapperton, i. c. 3, mention a case of eight 

 days' entire privation of w^ater, with dry food. 

 Burckhardt^ records an instance of like ab- 

 stinence, of the same duration, in the month of 

 August, and in his Notes on the Bedouins, 259, 

 he ascribes to the camels of Darfur the power 

 of dispensing with water for nine or ten days, 

 even w^hen on the march. The Tibboos and 

 other tribes, who constantly traverse the Sahara, 

 are very confidently affirmed to possess camels 

 which can support a privation of fifteen days 

 without serious inconvenience ; but this belief 

 rests on native authority, and I can find no 

 European traveller who testifies upon personal 

 observation to a longer abstinence, in the dry 



1 Bedouins, 258. 2]N'ubia, 186. 



