296 THE CAMEL 



are difficult to manage, and at times are very fractious 

 and troublesome, especially in the hands of men who do 

 not understand them. In fact, the whole question, no 

 matter what the animal, depends on the drivers, and 

 you will not obtain such good results from the very 

 finest mules in the hands of fools and ignoramuses as 

 you will out of moderate camels driven by good men, 

 and vice versa. 



It will therefore be seen from above that, though 

 the former for certain general conditions is superior to 

 the latter, the latter in reality has more points in his 

 favour, which quite equalise, if they do not counter- 

 balance, the drawbacks, but from which I should draw 

 the following deductions. That for certain services in 

 mountainous districts the mule par excellence is the 

 animal, and vice versa in flat countries the camel. But 

 again, for general transport purposes, in a large cam- 

 paign especially, on account of the last three points 

 chiefly the camel is undoubtedly the animal to employ. 

 Let us compare the comparative yearly cost approxi- 

 mately, of course of a company of camel transport,, 

 and of its mule equivalent, and let us take the organ- 

 isation of a company of the former to be as stated in 

 chapter xi. : 



1 captain at 400. a year ..... 400 



2 subalterns at 300Z. a year each .... 600 

 8 conductors at 1501. a year each .... 1,200 

 8 headmen at 6s. per day each=48 x 30=1,440 x 12 864 



200 drivers at 3s. per day each=600 x 30=18,000 x 12 10,800 



11 Europeans' rations at 2s. a day =22 x 30=660 x 12 396 



208 natives' rations at Is. a day=208 x 30=6,240 x 12 3,994 



18,254 

 Take a camel's ration at 8 Ib. of grain and 30 Ib. 



