ARABIAN CAMEL. 
153 
lilm as a restraint upon bis happiness,, he is, by 
experience, taught to regard them as the ramparts 
of his freedom. 
The camel is easily instructed in the methods of 
taking up and supporting his burden ; their legs,, 
a few days after they are produced, are bent under 
their belly ; they are in this manner loaded, and 
taught to rise ; their burden is every day thus in- 
creased, by insensible degrees, till the animal is 
capable of supporting a weight adequate to its 
force ; the same care is taken in making them 
patient of hunger and thirst 2 while other animals 
receive their food at stated times, the camel is 
restrained for days together, and these intervals 
of Tamine are increased in proportion as the ani- 
mal seems 5 capable of sustaining them. 
In Turkey, Persia, Arabia, Barbary, and Egypt, 
their whole commerce is carried on by means of 
camels, and no carriage is more speedy, and none 
less expensive in these countries. Merchants and 
travellers unite themselves into a body, furnished 
with camels, to secure themselves from the insults 
of the robbers that infest the countries in which 
they live. This assemblage is called a caravan, 
in which the numbers are sometimes known to 
amount to above ten thousand, and the number 
of camels is often greater than those of the men “ 
each of these animals is loaded according to his 
strength, and he is so sensible of it himself, that 
when his burden is too great, he remains still 
upon his belly, the posture in which he is laden, 
refusing to rise till his burden be lessened or taken 
away. In general the large camels are capable of 
carrying a thousand weight, and sometimes twelve 
hundred ; the smaller from six to seven. In these 
trading journeys, they travel but slowly, their 
stages are generally regulated, and they seldom go 
above thirty, or at most about five and thirty miles 
TO h, II. x 
