RUMINANT QUADRUPEDS. 105 
he is thirsty, or needs water to moisten his food as he 
eats it, he can force any amount that is required out of 
this reservoir up into the throat. By this arrangement 
the Camel can go without drinking for many days. 
Sometimes travelers, who are suffering severely from 
want of water, kill one of the Camels in their caravan 
for the purpose of getting at the water in this reservoir. 
178. The Camel is a strange-looking animal. The 
Pictorial Museum contains the following good descrip- 
tion of it: “There is something strange and imposing in 
the aspect of the gaunt and angular Camel, destitute, as 
it confessedly is, of grace and animation. We are 
amazed at its height, its uncouth proportions, its long, 
thin neck, its meagre limbs, and the huge hump on its 
back, which conveys the idea of distortion. Quietly it 
stands in one fixed attitude, its long-lashed eyelids droop- 
ing over the large dark eyes; it moves, and onward 
stalks with slow and measured steps, as if exercise were 
painful. To complete the picture, it 1s covered with 
shaggy hair irregularly disposed, here forming tangled 
masses, there almost wanting. Its thick mobile upper 
lip is deeply divided; its feet are large and spreading, 
the toes being merely tipped with little hoofs.” 
179. The docility of the Camel is such that one man 
can lead thirty, or even fifty of them, fastened together 
inarow. The traveler mounts the Camel as it is kneel- 
ing; and as it rises, contrary to the habit of all other ani- 
mals, upon its hind feet first, he will be thrown suddenly 
over its head unless he is especially careful. The im- 
portance of the Camel in the regions where it is found 
can hardly be realized by us. It is essential, as you have 
seen, wherever wide deserts are to be traversed ; and St. 
Hilaire, in his Letters on Egypt, says that “ without it 
nearly the whole of Africa and one quarter of Asia might 
perhaps have remained uninhabited.” This statement is 
rather too strong, but it shows what is the estimate of 
the Camel’s value by one who had traveled extensively 
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