THE rSES OF THE CAMEL. 



erosity, which probably astonishes the Arab who indulges in it 

 quite as much as the animal who is the amazed recipient. 

 When stabled in cities they are fed on hay and chopped straw, 

 and consume about half the average allowance for a horse. 

 The fat of the camel, when he has any, goes to the hump. 

 This is his storehouse of nutriment, which he there secretes 

 when it is abundant, and reabsorbs when it is not found else- 

 where sufficient for his wants. The first point that an Arab 

 jockey regards, in bargaining for a camel, is the external ap- 

 pearance of the hump. As that is full or shrivelled, so does he 

 estimate the condition of the animal. After long and tedious 

 journeys, the hump is often seen flattened to near the level of 

 the back. 



Major Wayne, of the United States Army, in a report upon 

 camels, to the Secretary of War, dated on board the Supply," 

 April 10th, 1856, says : " Beyond this supplying with food by 

 reabsorption, the hump does not seem to be intimately connected 

 with the animal's vitality ; for Linant Bey informed me that he 

 had repeatedly opened, with a sharp knife, the humps of his 

 dromedaries, when from high feeding they had become so 

 plump as to prevent the fitting of the saddle, and removed 

 large portions of the fat, without in any manner injuring or 

 affecting the general health of the animal." 



Not only is the hump a store-house of solid nutriment, on 

 which the camel may draw ad libitum as long as it lasts, but 

 he is provided with water-tanks in his stomach, where he can 

 stow away his water for a cruise, like an outward-bound galliot 

 before the time of patent condensers. He has not only four 

 stomachs, but there is in one of them a kind of reservoir, formed 

 of cavities or cells, capable of holding several gallons of water. 

 And he is also fitted up with pumps like a sliip, and can pump 

 the water up out of his tanks into his mouth, to moisten his 

 often dry and dusty food. Indeed, Cuvier supposes, and more 

 recent naturalists have accepted the theory, that this ancient 

 and honorable animal, who browsed about the grounds of the 

 first Pharaoh, is furnished with that triumph of modern im- 

 provements known as a patent condenser. His conjecture was, 

 that the stomach of the camel is not only able to retain for 

 many days water swallowed by the animal, but that it possesses 

 the further power of secreting a special fluid for moistening the 



