RUMINANTIA. 



135 



two bones of the metacarpus and metatarsus are imited into a single one, designated the 

 cannon bone; but in certain species there are also vestiges of lateral metacarpal and metatai-sal 

 bones. 



The name Buminantia intimates the singular faculty possessed by these animals, of masti- 

 cating their food a second time, it being returned to the mouth after the first deglutition. 

 Tliis faculty depends on the structure of their stomachs, which are always four in number, 

 the first three of which are so disposed that the food may enter into either of them, the 

 (rsophagus termmating at the point of communication. 



The first and laj'gest stomach is named the paunch; it receives a large quantity of vegetable 

 matters coarsely bruised by the first mastication. From this it passes into the second, termed 

 the honey-comb bag, the parietes of which are laminated like the cells of Bees. This second 

 stomach, very small and globular, seizes the food, and moistens and compresses it into httle 

 pellets (or cuds), which afterwards successively return to the mouth to be rechewed. The 

 animal remains at rest during this operation, which lasts until all the herbage first taken into 

 the paunch has been subjected to it. The aliment thus remasticated descends directly into 

 the third stomach, termed the feuillet, on account of its parietes being longitudinally lami- 

 nated somewhat like the leaves of a book, from which it descends into the fom-th or caillette, 

 the coats of which are wrmkled, and which is the true organ of digestion, analogous to the 

 simple stomach of animals in general. In the young of the ruminants, while they continue to 

 subsist on the milk of the mother, the caUlette is the largest of the four. The jjaunch is only 

 developed by receiving great quantities of herbage, which finally give it its enormous volume. 

 These animals have the intestinal canal very long ; but there are few enlargements in the 

 great intestines. The coecum is likewise long and tolerably smooth. Their fat hardens more 

 by cooling than that of other quadi-upeds, and even becomes brittle. It is commonly termed 

 tallow. The udder is placed between the thighs. 



The Ruminants, of all animals, are those which are most useful to Man. They furnish liim 

 with food, and nearly all the flesh that he consumes. Some serve him as beasts of burden, 

 others with their milk, their tallow, leather, horns, and other products. 



The two first genera are without horns. 



The Camels {Camelus, Lin.), — 

 Approximate the preceding order rather more than the others. They have not only always canines in 

 both jaws, but have also two pointed teeth implanted in the intermaxillary bones, six inferior incisors, 

 and from eighteen to twenty molars only ; pecuHarities which, of all the Rumiuantia, tliey alone 

 jiossess, besides which the scaphoid and cuboid bones of the tarsus are separated. Instead of the 

 great hoof, flat at its inner side, which envelopes the whole inferior portion of each toe, and which 

 determines the figure of the ordinary cloven foot, they have but one small one, which only adheres to 

 the last phalanx, and is symmetrically formed hke the hoofs of the Pachydermata. Their tumid and 

 cleft lip. their long neck, projecting orbits, weakness of the crupper, and the disagreeable proportions 

 of their legs and feet, render them in some sort deformed ; but their extreme sobriety, and the faculty 

 they possess of passing several days without drinking, cause them to be of the highest utility. 



It is proliable that this last faculty results from the great masses of cells which cover the sides of 

 then- paunch, in which water is constantly retained or produced. The other Runnnants have nothing 

 of the land. 



Camels urinate backward, but the direction of the penis changes during copulation, which is effecled 



with considerable difficulty, and while the female hes down. In the rutting season a fetid humour 



issues from the head. 



The Camels, properly so called, — 



Have the two toes united below, almost to the point, by a common sole, and humps of fat upon tlic 

 back. They are large animals of the Eastern Continent, of which two species are known, both of them 

 completely domesticated.* 



i 



I 1 



states, on tin 

 are wild f.'.itn 



thority of tht Buchanans and Tartars, 

 in the deserts of Central Asia ; but we 



nark that the Calmucks are in the habit u( liberating all i 

 aU from a religious principle. 



