MAMMALIA 121 



what they lack in beauty. Kipling's faithful delineation of the 

 "gawd-forsaken oont" is too well known to need quotation, but 

 the following vivid account of the purchase of a camel given by 

 Conan Doyle {Daily News of April 21, 1896) is probably less 

 familiar. 



" There are camels to be bought, and it is a study in Eastern 

 "ways to see the Daily News buying them. Some men have the 

 ^ift of pantomime, and some have not. I know by experience 

 that I have not. On the occasion of an eclipse of the moon I 

 endeavoured to explain the cause of it by gesture to an Arab. 

 I pointed to the moon and to the earth. Then I pointed to 

 a, horse and to his shadow. Presently the Arab rose and began 

 to examine the horse's hind-legs, and I found that I had convinced 

 Jiim that the creature was ill. I have given up gestures since then. 

 But the Daily News has all the Arab's energy of movement, with 

 a. good command of abuse, and some powers as a pedestrian. 

 With these gifts, one may buy camels. 



" Having looked depreciatingly at the beast — and you cannot 

 take a better model than the creature's own expression as it looks 

 sX you — you ask how much is wanted for it. The owner says 

 sixteen pounds. You then give a shriek of derision, sweep your 

 arm across as if to wave him and his camel out of your sight 

 for ever, and, turning with a whisk, you set off rapidly in the other 

 direction. How far you go depends upon the price asked. If 

 it is really very high, you may not get back for your dinner. But 

 as a rule, a hundred yards or so meet the case, and you shape 

 your course so as to reach the camel and its owner. You stop in 

 front of them and look at them with a disinterested and surprised 

 ■expression, to intimate that you wonder that they should still be 

 loitering there. The Arab asks how much you will give. You 

 answer eight pounds. Then it is his turn to scream, whisk round, 

 and do his hundred yards, his absurd chattel with his hornpipe 

 legs trotting along behind him. But he returns to say that he will 

 take fourteen, and off you go again with a howl and a wave. So 

 the bargaining goes on, the circles continually shortening, until 

 you have settled upon the middle price. But it is only when you 

 have bought your camel that your troubles begin. It is the 

 strangest and most deceptive creature in the world. Its appear- 

 ance is so staid and respectable that you cannot give it credit 

 for the black villainy that lurks within. It approaches you with 



