50 CLASS MAMMALIA. 



at liberty in a gravid state, or furnishing milk to their 

 owners, who load them only when moving their women and 

 children. 



This species extends from the foot of Caucasus over 

 Persia and Turkey, Arabia, Northern Africa, and India. 



The brown, or Turkish variety, has long been used to 

 draw water, by moving in a circle attached to a machine, 

 at the Menagerie of the King's Garden at Paris ; and at 

 this work, M. F. Cuvier observes, it executes a more labo- 

 rious task than two horses could perform, although its 

 food is less; and he infers from this, that the variety in 

 question might be introduced to advantage in the domestic 

 economy of Central and Southern Europe, especially as expe- 

 rience has proved at that place, that their successful pro- 

 pagation in that latitude seems to demand little precaution 

 or trouble. 



The Lamas. {Auchenia, Illig.) 



The Auchenice or Lamas, form a secondary group of camels 

 peculiar to America: designated at first as a kind of sheep, 

 they were long known in Europe ; but from the particular 

 reserve which characterized all the concerns of Spanish 

 Colonies, their real history and genus was barely indicated, 

 till the Abbe Beliardi furnished Buffon with details, which 

 even more recent writers have not known how to appre- 

 ciate. The Count and Linnaeus admitted but two species, 

 resting indeed upon individuals brought alive to Europe ; 

 but Molina, writing more from memory than documents 

 immediately before him, led Shaw, Schreber, and others, 

 to admit five. More recent observations have established 

 three, and it is probable that the remaining are varieties, 

 produced by climate and domestication. 



Originally the Peruvian word Lama may have desig- 

 nated only one of the species, which by extension was 

 subsequently applied to all : there is indeed so general a 



