f«2 THE CAMEL 



veredj which were unknown to the ancients, it 

 appears, that the dromedary is incomparably 

 more numerous, and more generally difiufed, 

 than the camel. The latter is found only in 

 Turkeilan *, and fome other places of the Le- 

 vant t« But, in Arabia, the dromedary is 

 more common than any other bead of burden. 

 It is likewife very numerous iii all the nor- 

 thern parts of Africa J, from the Mediterranean 

 fea to the river Niger ||. It is alio found in 



Egypt* 



* The Academy having ordered the miflloners fent to 

 China, in quality of King's mathematicians, to obtain infor- 

 mation concerning forrfe particulars in the hiftory of the ca- 

 mel, the Perfian ambaffador gave the following anfwers to 

 the queries put to him by M. Conftance: i. That, in Perfia, 

 there were camels with two bunches on the back ; but that 

 they came originally from Turkeitan, and belong to the race 

 of thofe which the King of the Moors had brought from 

 that country, the only known part of Afia where this 

 kind exifts ; and that thofe camels were highly efteemed in 

 Perfia, becauie their two bunches render them more proper 

 for carriages. 2. That thefe bunches are not formed by a cur- 

 vature of the back-bone, which is here as low as in any other 

 part, but are only excrefcences of a glandulous fubftance, fimi- 

 lar to that which compofes the udders of other animals; and 

 that the interior bunch is about fix inches high, and the po- 

 fterior an inch lower ; Mem. pour fervir a i'btft, des animauk, 

 part, l . p. 80. 



f The camels of the Calmuck Tartars are pretty large and 

 ftrong ; but they have all two bunches ; Relation de la Grandt 

 Tartarle, p. 267. 



X Camelus animal blandum ac domeflicum maxima copia 

 in Africa invenitur, praefertim in defertis Libyae, Numidiae, 

 et Barbariae; Leon. Afric. defcript. Jfricae, vol. 2. pag. 748. 



|[ The Moors have numerous flocks of camels upon the 

 banks of the Niger; Voyage an Senegal, par M* Adarfon, p. 36. 



