446 NAUTRAL HISTORY OF AFRICA. 
but it has been ascertained that all the species of 
that genus are confined to the new world, and that 
the supposed ant-eater of the old world belongs to 
another genus, or tribe, entitled orycteropus, which 
is characterized by its grinders and claws. There 
is but one species of the genus named O. capensis, 
which occurs at the Cape of Good Hope. 
Africa is richer in animals of the horse tribe 
than any other quarter of the globe. In its south- 
ern extremity there are two species, the zebra and 
quagga, both distinguished by the beautiful mark- 
ing of their skin ; and Northern Africa affords 
the common horse, and also the wild ass. 
Of all the domesticated animals, not originally 
natives of Africa, the dromedary is the .most im- 
portant and useful to the natives. It is their prin- 
cipal beast of burden, and is by them emphatically 
named the ship of the desert. If the dromedary 
did not possess an astonishing degree of temper- 
ance, — if it had not the power of supporting thirst 
for a great length of time, — and of traversing with 
rapidity immense distances, over deserts covered 
with a deep and burning sand, vast tracts, both of 
Africa and Asia, would be uninhabited and waste. 
The most remarkable of all the bisulcated, 
or hoofed animals of Africa, is the giraffe, or ca- 
melopard, which is distributed through this conti- 
nent from the northern frontier of the colony at the 
Cape of Good Hope, as far north as Egypt. Its 
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