86 THE CAMEL. 



and seed-pods of the acacias and other prickly 

 trees or shrubs, of thistles, and of the saline 

 plants so common in the desert; and almost 

 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. 1 His powerful jaws and teeth enable him 

 to grind and masticate branches of the hardest 

 wood as thick as the finger. His palate is lined 

 with a very hard cartilage ; and the inside of the 

 lip, the tongue, and the gums are protected by 

 a skin almost equally impenetrable. The lips 

 are, nevertheless, very flexible, and the upper 

 labrum is divided. In feeding on the acacia or 

 other prickly plants, he retracts and partially in- 

 verts the lips, grasps the twigs with the tongue 

 and jaws, and thus crops and chews the thorniest 

 shrubs with impunity. 



The camels domesticated in Tuscany, which, 

 though degenerated by a residence of centuries 



1 Carbuccia, page 10, says that the camel never touches 

 the " aloe ; " but an official report, at page 182 of the same 

 volume, enumerates the " cactus " among the wild vegetables 

 consumed by him. Hammer-Purgstall, p. 1 7, mentions the 

 coloquintida among the vegetables eaten by the camel. 

 There are two or three species of this bitter plant in the 

 Sinaitic peninsula, in Wady el Araba, and the valleys of 

 Mount Seir, but I have always seen camels, however hungry, 

 refuse them. 



