156 HISTORY OF QUADRUPEDS. 



themselves with their feet nor their teeth. When 

 angry, they have no other method of revenging 

 injuries, but by spitting. They can throw out 

 their saliva to the distance of ten paces ; and if it 

 fall on the skin it raises an itching, accompanied 

 with a slight inflammation. Their flesh is eaten, 

 and said to be as good as mutton. 



Like the Camel, they have the faculty of abstain- 

 ing long from water (sometimes four or five days) ; 

 and, like that animal, their food is coarse and 

 trifling. They are neither allowed corn nor hay; 

 green herbage, of which they eat very moderately, 

 is sufficient for their nourishment. 



The wild Lamas, called Guanacos, are stronger 

 and more active than the domestic kind. They live 

 in herds, and inhabit the highest regions of the 

 Cordelieres. They run with great swiftness in 

 places of difficult access, where Dogs cannot easily 

 follow them. The most usual way of killing them 

 is with the gun. They are hunted for the sake of 

 their flesh and their hair: of the latter the Indians 

 make cloth. 



The Lama resembles the Camel in the form of its 

 body, but is without the dorsal hunch: its head is 

 small and well shaped; its neck long, and very 

 protuberant near its junction with the body : in its 

 domestic state, its hair is short and smooth; when 

 wild, it is coarse and long, of a yellowish colour : a 

 black line runs along the top of the back, from the 

 head to the tail. The tame ones vary in colour : some 

 of them are white, others black, others of a mixed 

 colour white, grey, and russet, dispersed in spots. 

 Its tail is short : its ears are four inches long : its 

 feet are cloven, like those of the Ox, and are armed 

 behind with a spur, by which the animal is enabled 



