MARCHING AND CARRYING POWER 205 



mere infliction of it will tell on him in the end. I have, 

 for the matter of that, seen a porter in Egypt stagger- 

 ing under 1,000 to 1,200 Ib. for a few yards. The same 

 argument, but in a greater degree, applies to the camel 

 carrying 1,000 Ib. for several days ; and even 560 Ib. 

 for an extremely long hard journey like that from the 

 interior of Africa, across those immense wastes, to 

 Egypt is not to be despised. It is positively ludicrous, 

 and I should like to give some of these wiseacres a 

 turn at tail-twisting a camel under the same con- 

 ditions as we had in Afghanistan from 1878-80, or up 

 the Nile in 1884-5. Never again would they venture 

 to make such appalling statements, and never again, if I 

 mistake not, would they volunteer for transport work 

 on service. There are times when, on good roads, with 

 abundance of food, &c. in fact, under the most favour- 

 able circumstances for a short journey, that a camel 

 will carry a considerable weight. I have seen 600 Ib. 

 and more carried in the Panjab; and in Egypt the 

 El Arish camel, used by the Egyptian Artillery, and 

 Delta camels generally, take about the same weight. 

 The Bactrian species are up to greater weight than the 

 Arabian, and those of Turkestan, of this species, when 

 in good condition and of average strength, carry up to 

 550 lb- for long journeys. I remember reading some 

 years ago a translation from the Eussian, on their 

 expeditions in the Khivan and Khirgiz steppes, where 

 the writer speaks of the camels which are found in the 

 latter carrying from 480 to 880 Ibs,, according to the 

 time of the year ; but as many of his remarks regarding 

 the camel he was writing from a military point of 

 view were distinctly of the Brobdingnagian order, and 



