INLAND CONVEYANCE. 



* I A HE artificial conveyance of person and pro- 

 JL perty from one locality to another may be 

 treated under two great heads Inland and Mari- 

 time. To these, science may in time add a third 

 namely, Aerial; but as yet, all the schemes and 

 experiments in this department have been without 

 much available result. Confining our remarks, 

 therefore, to what is real and practicable roads, 

 rivers, canals, and railways may be regarded as the 

 main channels of inland transport. The consider- 

 ation of ocean transport is reserved for a subsequent 

 number. As a fitting introduction to our present 

 subject, both in point of information and interest, 

 we may briefly advert to the modes of conveyance 

 adopted by nations but little advanced in the arts 

 of civilisation. 



PRIMITIVE MODES OF CONVEYANCE. 



The means adopted in early times for artificial 

 transport were, as may be supposed, of the rudest 

 kind, as is still the case in those countries which 

 are little advanced in the useful arts. The most 

 degrading species of conveyance that seems to 

 have been practised, was the employment of human 

 labour in bearing litters or palanquins, specimens 

 of which, on a scale of barbarous splendour, are 

 now seen in India, Burmah, and China. 



The first and most obvious improvement in 

 modes of transport was the substitution of brute 

 for human labour ; and it is reasonable to conclude 

 that the value of this practice could not have been 

 long in being pressed on the attention of mankind. 

 We find the term ' beasts of burden ' used in the 

 most ancient records, the animals meant being the 

 ass, the horse, and the camel. No trace, however, 

 exists of the progress from burden to draught, 

 though it also must have taken place at a very 

 early period. The ass and horse are equally 

 adapted for carrying or drawing, but the camel 

 exerts its power only by carrying ; draught alone 

 is suitable for the reindeer and ox, the backs of 

 these animals being unfit by nature for burden. 



Burden. 



From the earliest times, the camel has been 

 employed in the sandy regions of Asia as a beast 

 of burden ; and without its invaluable services in 

 this respect, these countries could scarcely have 

 been habitable. The camel is expressly suited 

 by nature for inhabiting and traversing sandy and 

 parched deserts, in which there are places of rest 

 and refreshment only at wide intervals. 



The camels, along with the llama, alpaca, &c. 

 of South America, form a family of ruminants called 

 Camelidce. The Camelidtz of South America 

 have no trace of the hump or humps that charac- 

 terise their congeners of the Old World. The 

 hump on the camel's back is a wonderful pro- 

 vision of nature, to adapt the animal to the en- 

 durance of long abstinence from food, or subsist- 

 ence on very scanty supplies, to which it is often 

 subjected in the desert, and without a capacity for 

 28 



j which it would be comparatively of little value to 

 i man ; and the wide deserts, across which he jour- 

 neys and transports his merchandise by its aid 

 would be altogether unpassable. The hump is, in 

 fact, a store of fat, from which the animal draws 

 as the wants of its system require ; and the Arab 

 is very careful to see that the hump is in good 

 condition before the commencement of a journey. 

 After it has been much exhausted, three or four 

 months of repose and abundant food are necessary 

 to restore it. The back-bone of the camel is as 

 straight as that of other quadrupeds. Another 

 very interesting adaptation to the desert is to be 

 noticed in the thick sole which protects the feet of 

 the camel from the burning sand, and in callosities 

 of similar use on the chest and on the joints of the 

 legs, upon which the camel rests when it lies down 

 to repose, or kneels, as it does for various purposes, 

 and is taught to do that it may be loaded, or that 

 its rider may mount upon its back. But most 

 interesting of all is the provision made for the 

 camel's endurance of long drought, by the lining 

 of the inside of the second stomach, or honey-comb 

 bag, and of a portion of the first stomach, or 

 paunch, with great masses of cells, in which water 

 is stored up and long retained. This store of water 

 is well known to the Arabs, who, when sore pressed 

 by thirst, sometimes avail themselves of it by kill- 

 ing some of the camels of the caravan. 



A caravan sometimes contains 1000, some- 

 times even 4000 or 5000 camels. The supply 

 of food carried with the caravan for the use of the 

 camels is very scanty : a few beans, dates, carob- 

 pods, or the like, are all that they receive after a 

 long day's march, when there is no herbage on 

 which they may browse. The pace of the loaded 

 camel is steady and uniform, but slow ; it proceeds, 

 however, from day to day, accomplishing journeys 

 of hundreds of miles at a rate of about i\ miles 

 per hour. Some of the slight dromedaries, how- 

 ever, can carry a rider more than 100 miles in a 

 day. The motion of the camel is peculiar, jolting 

 the rider in a manner extremely disagreeable to 

 those who are unaccustomed to it ; both the feet 

 on the same side being successively raised, so that 

 one side is thrown forward, and then the other. 



Turning to the New World, we find that, 

 from the remotest period to which the Peruvian 

 records extend, the aborigines not only used the 

 llama and alpaca for food and clothing, but also 

 employed them in their military and domestic 

 service, as the Arabs do the camel. The llama 

 was principally destined to carry burdens, although, 

 compared with the Asiatic drudge, the difference 

 in size and strength is considerable. Its load, 

 according to Mr Walton, never exceeded 150 

 pounds, with which it was not required to travel 

 more than three leagues per day ; whereas in the 

 working part of the twenty-four hours the camel 

 journeys double that distance with 800 pounds or 

 more upon his back. 



We need scarcely advert to the fact, that wher- 

 ever civilisation has made any progress, the horse, 



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