INTRODUCTION 3 



camel was, as we know, a native of Arabia or of the 

 regions adjacent, and could have easily crossed over 

 into Greece in those prehistoric days when Europe 

 and Africa were joined together, and the Mediterranean 

 was a huge lake. 



So far as we can gather from the oldest manuscripts Mosaic 

 extant, the camel has been employed as a beast of r 

 burden since the beginning, at all events, of Mosaic 

 traditions, and prior to the formation of the Jews into 

 a nation. Mention is made of it several times in the 

 earlier books of the Old Testament. Arabia, according 

 to these ancient records and traditions, has been longer 

 associated with him than any other country, and there 

 seems to be no doubt, as previously remarked, that he 

 was indigenous to that country, or some adjoining 

 portion of South-west Asia, from whence he must have 

 spread into the countries contiguous, extending gradu- 

 ally into the arid regions of Eastern Asia and Northern 

 Africa. The natural inference is that he was reclaimed 

 from a state of nature, and domesticated by the patri- 

 archal Arabs, long before the days when Abraham 

 was driven into Egypt by famine, and was presented 

 by Pharaoh, in a style truly Oriental in its magnifi- 

 cence, 'with sheep, oxen, he-asses, and men-servants 

 and maid-servants, she-asses, and camels.' Curiously 

 enough, Eawlinson, in his c History of Egypt,' can find 

 no traces of the camel in the hieroglyphics ; and yet, 

 connected by dry land as Egypt was to the very birth- 

 place of the camel, as well as by commercial transactions, 

 it stands to reason that the camel must have been in 

 general use there about that time. The story of the 

 courtship of Isaac and Eebekah is familiar to some of 



B 2 



