THE SOLD IE HS CAMEL 
3°3 
transport in war-time. The natural liking of English- 
men for domestic animals of all kinds is quite equalled 
by the skill they usually show in their management. 
Yet the sufferings of our transport animals in war are 
such as at any other time would cause a pang to the 
national conscience. It is a fact that the feeling of 
humanity, which will not tolerate the overcrowding of 
a cattle-ship, is scarcely shocked when, as in the 
Afghan War, twenty-thousand camels perish, mainly 
from mismanagement, or when a transport officer can 
write of the fate of those creatures in the Nile Expe- 
dition — “ Seeing, as I have done, hundreds and thou- 
sands of camels die from sheer exhaustion, brought on 
by neglect and ill-treatment, arising from down-right 
stupidity, obstinacy, and ignorance, is enough to make 
one ashamed of having had any connection with the 
business.” The push across the Bayuda Desert was 
a race against time ; yet it hardly seems consonant 
with the usual fairness of Englishmen to their 
“ mounts,” that of the thousand camels used, probably 
not one survived the treatment it received ; and Count 
Gleichen, writing after service with the Camel Corps 
throughout the war, says, “ I am afraid we looked 
upon them as mere machines for carrying, and hardly 
thought of their sufferings from hunger and thirst as 
long as they could be whacked along.” This was 
after the battle of Metemmeh. Of the same example 
of cruel and disastrous mismanagement Sir C. Rivers 
Wilson says — “ The camels had been without water 
for from six to seven days, having been accustomed 
