NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 105 



Bactrian camel, remarks, that tlie dorsal vertebrse of 

 the animal on which he made his observations had 

 been modified by the pressure of its loads. We know 

 that b}^ careful breeding the horns of the ox and the 

 sheep may be made to assume almost every grade of 

 excess and defect, till they vanish altogether, and a horn- 

 less race is obtained. Those who delight in oddities 

 know how to secure a breed of rumpless fowls and tail- 

 less cats. The dapper, clean-legged bantams, for which 

 Sir John Sebright was famous, were remarkable for the 

 absence of the sickle-shaped, drooping feathers, from the 

 tails of the cocks, whence they were called by some 

 bird-fanciers ' Hencocks.' This absence had been the 

 result of the greatest care and attention to the breed. 

 In all these cases the change or modification is limited 

 to externals. The internal organization of the animals 

 remains absolutely the same. 



'Now, whether we look at the grotesque figure of the 

 camel, or investigate its internal structure, we find the 

 most unmistakable evidence of adaptation to that state 

 of life to which it has pleased the great Author of its 

 being to call it. Born for the desert, the callosities pre- 

 vent the skin from cracking at those points where the 

 weight of the animal rests upon the arid, burning sands. 

 The strong, nipper-like upper incisor teeth are fit instru- 

 ments for cutting through the tough plants and shrubs 

 that spring here and there on those boundless wastes. The 

 nostrils are so organized that the animal can effectually 

 close them, and defy the stormy destructive sand-drifts 

 that sweep harmlessly by him. ' The desert ship' seems 

 to float rather than step on the elastic, padlike cushions 

 of its spreading feet, moving as noiselessly as Mr. Mark's 

 vulcanized indian-rubber wheel-tires convey a caniage 

 over a granite pavement. 



Wliat always struck me as something extremely romantic and 

 mysterious (writes Mr. Macfarlane) was the noiseless step of the 



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