228 THE CAMEL 



among camels that are suffering from debility brought 

 on by overwork and starvation. Another good remedy 

 is to mix sweet or train oil with a fourth part of its 

 weight of sulphur and rub it well into the affected 

 parts ; this should be left on for two or three days, 

 and then washed off* with soap and water. When the 

 skin is dry give a second application, and if necessary 

 a third ; but in slight cases two are usually enough. 

 A camel badly affected requires half a gallon of oil 

 and 1 Ib. of sulphur for each application. 



Both were very common in Afghanistan and Suakim, 

 as I well know to my cost. I do not recollect it being so 

 prevalent up the Mle ; but many camels, Y.-S. Phillips 

 told me, suffered from a skin disease which was neither 

 itch nor mange, and, if I remember rightly, was not 

 contagious. It was also due to change of diet, constant 

 use of dry food, grain especially, want of time for 

 natural mastication and digestion, and an inadequate 

 supply of water. And it was his opinion that this 

 withholding of water for days, which was frequently 

 done, as I have before pointed out, owing to the mis- 

 taken impression prevailing that it is necessary to do 

 this in order to prepare the camel for desert marching, 

 was utter nonsense. Entire change of diet and general 

 management were, he said, the chief factors in the pro- 

 duction of this disease, which I imagine is the same as 

 that which Y.-S. Steel, in writing on camels in the 

 Afghan war, speaks of as ' scurvy.' He writes*: ' Mr. 

 Kettlewell suggests that the chronic diseases of the 

 lungs might be of a scorbutic (scurvy) character, the 

 result of the depraved and impure blood through a 

 deficiency of vegetable acids. A reference to the 



