or Camel, in zoology, a genus of quadrupeds belonging to the order of pecora. The characters of the camel are these: It has no horns; it has five fore-teeth in the lower jaw; the laniarii are wide set, three in the upper, and two in the lower jaw; and there is a fissure in the upper lip, resembling a cleft in the lip of a hare. The species are:

1. The dromedarius, or Arabian camel, with one bunch or protuberance on the back. It has four callous protuberances on the fore-legs, and two on the hind ones. This species is common in Africa, and the warmer parts of Asia; not that it is spread over either of the continents. It is a common beast of burden in Egypt, and along the countries which border on the Mediterranean Sea; in the kingdom of Morocco, Sara or the Desert, and in Ethiopia: but nowhere south of those kingdoms. In Asia, it is equally common in Turkey and Arabia; but is scarcely seen farther north than Persia, being too tender to bear a more severe climate. India is destitute of this animal.

2. The Bactrianus, or Bactrian camel, has two bunches on the back, but is in all other respects like the preceding; of which it seems to be a mere variety, rather than a different species; and is equally adapted for riding or carrying loads. It is still found wild in the deserts of the temperate parts of Asia, particularly in those between China and India. These are larger and more generous than the domesticated race. The Bactrian camel, which is very common in Asia, is extremely hardy, and in great use among the Tartars and Mongols, as a beast of burden, from the Caspian Sea to the empire of China. It bears even to severe a climate as that of Siberia, being found about the lake Baikal, where the Burats and Mongols keep great numbers. They are far less than those which inhabit Western Tartary. Here they live during winter on willows and other trees, and are by this diet reduced very lean. They lose their hair in April, and go naked till May, amidst the frosts of that severe climate. To thrive, they must have dry ground and salt marshes. There are several varieties among the camels. The Turkman is the largest and strongest. The Arabian is hardy. What is called the Dromedary, Mailhary, and Ragualh, is very swift. The commonest travel about 30 miles a day. The last, which has a less bunch, and more delicate shape, and also is much inferior in size, never carries burdens; but is used to ride on. In Arabia, they are trained for running-matches; and in many places for carrying couriers, who can go above 100 miles a day on them; and that for nine days together, over burning deserts, uninhabitable by any living creature. The African camels are the most hardy, having more distant and more dreadful deserts to pass over than any of the others, from Numidia to the kingdom of Ethiopia. In Western Tartary there is a white variety, very scarce, and sacred to the idols and priests. The Chinese have a swift variety, which they call by the expressive name of Fong Kyo Fo, or camels with feet of the wind. Fat of camels, or, as those people call it, oil of bunches, being drawn from them, is esteemed in many disorders, such as ulcers, numbness, and consumptions. This species of camel is rare in Arabia, being an exotic, and only kept by the great men.

Camels have constituted the riches of Arabia from the time of Job to the present day. The patriarch reckoned 6000 camels among his pastoral treasures, and the modern Arabs estimate their wealth by the numbers of these useful animals. Without them great part of Africa would be wretched; by them the whole commerce is carried through arid and burning tracts, impassable but by beasts which Providence formed expressly for the scorched deserts. Their foals are adapted to the sands they are to pass over, their toughness and springy softness preventing them from cracking. Their great powers of sustaining abstinence from drinking, enables them to pass over unwatered tracts for many days, without requiring the least liquid; and their patience under hunger is such, that they will travel many days fed only with a few dates, or some small balls of bean or barley-meal, or on the miserable thorny plants they meet with in the deserts.

The Arabians regard the camel as a present from heaven, a sacred animal, without whose affluence they could neither subsist, carry on trade, nor travel. Ca- Camel's milk is their common food. They also eat its flesh, that of the young camel being reckoned highly savoury. Of the hair of those animals, which is fine and soft, and which is completely renewed every year, the Arabians make stuffs for clothes, and other furniture. With their camels, they not only want nothing, but have nothing to fear. In one day, they can perform a journey of fifty leagues into the desert, which cuts off every approach from their enemies. All the armies of the world would perish in pursuit of a troop of Arabs. Hence they never submit, unless from choice, to any power. With a view to his predatory expeditions, the Arab instructs, rears, and exercises his camels. A few days after their birth, he folds their limbs under their belly, forces them to remain on the ground, and, in this situation, loads them with a pretty heavy weight, which is never removed but for the purpose of replacing a greater. Instead of allowing them to feed at pleasure, and to drink when they are dry, he begins with regulating their meals, and makes them gradually travel long journeys, diminishing, at the same time, the quantity of their aliment. When they acquire some strength, they are trained to the course. He excites their emulation by the example of horses, and, in time, renders them more robust. In fine, after he is certain of the strength, fleetness, and sobriety of his camels, he loads them both with his own and their food, sets off with them, arrives unperceived at the confines of the desert, robs the first passengers he meets, pillages the solitary houses, loads his camels with the booty, and, if pursued, he is obliged to accelerate his retreat. It is on these occasions that he unfolds his own talents and those of the camels. He mounts one of the fleetest, conducts the troop, and makes them travel night and day, without, almost, either stopping, eating, or drinking; and, in this manner, he easily performs a journey of three hundred leagues in eight days. During this period of motion and fatigue, his camels are perpetually loaded, and he allows them each day, one hour only of repose, and a ball of paste. They often run in this manner nine or ten days, without finding water; and when, by chance, there is a pool at some distance, they scent the water half a league off. Thirst makes them double their pace, and they drink as much at once as serves them for the time that is past, and as much to come; for their journeys often last several weeks, and their abstinence continues an equal time.

Of all carriages, that by camels is the cheapest and most expeditious. The merchants and other passengers unite in a caravan, to prevent the insults and robberies of the Arabs. These caravans are often very numerous, and are always composed of more camels than men. Each camel is loaded in proportion to his strength; and, when overloaded, he refuses to march, and continues lying till his burden is lightened. The large camels generally carry a thousand, or even twelve hundred pounds weight, and the smallest from five to seven hundred. In these commercial travels, their march is not hastened: As the route is often seven or eight hundred leagues, their motions and journeys are regulated. They walk only, and perform about from ten to twelve leagues each day. Every night they are unloaded, and allowed to pasture at freedom. When in a rich country, or fertile meadow, they eat, in less than an hour, as much as serves them to ruminate the whole night, and to nourish them during twenty-four hours. But they seldom meet with such pastures; neither is this delicate food necessary for them. They even seem to prefer wormwood, thistles, nettles, broom, cattail, and other prickly vegetables, to the softer herbage. As long as they find plants to browse, they easily dispense with drink. This facility of obtaining long from drink proceeds not, however, from habit alone, but is rather an effect of their structure. Independent of the four stomachs, which are common to ruminating animals, the camels have a fifth bag, which serves them as a reservoir for water. This fifth stomach is peculiar to the camel. It is so large as to contain a vast quantity of water, where it remains without corrupting, or mixing with the other aliments. When the animal is palled with thirst, and has occasion for water to macerate his dry food in ruminating, he makes part of this water mount into his paunch, or even as high as the oesophagus, by a simple contraction of certain muscles. It is by this singular construction that the camel is enabled to pass several days without drinking, and to take at a time a prodigious quantity of water, which remains in the reservoir pure and limpid, because neither the liquors of the body, nor the juices of digestion, can mix with it. Travellers, when much oppressed with drought, are sometimes obliged to kill their camels in order to have a supply of drink from these reservoirs. These inoffensive creatures must suffer much; for they utter the most lamentable cries, especially when overloaded. But, though perpetually oppressed, their fortitude is equal to their docility. At the first signal, they bend their knees and lie down to be loaded, which saves their conductor the trouble of raising the goods to a great height. As soon as they are loaded, they rise spontaneously, and without any affixture. One of them is mounted by their conductor, who goes before, and regulates the march of all the followers. They require neither whip nor spur. But, when they begin to be tired, their courage is supported, or rather their fatigue is charmed, by fingering, or by the sound of some instrument. Their conductors relieve each other in fingering; and, when they want to prolong the journey, they give the animals but one hour's rest; after which, refusing their fong, they proceed on their march for several hours more, and the fingering is continued till they arrive at another resting place, when the camels again lie down; and their loads, by unloosing the ropes, are allowed to glide off on each side of the animals. Thus they sleep on their bellies in the middle of their baggage, which, next morning is fixed on their backs with equal quickness and facility as it had been detached the evening before.

Fatigue, hunger, thirst, and meagreness, are not the only inconveniences to which these animals are subjected: To all these evils they are prepared by castration. One male is only left for eight or ten females; and the labouring camels are generally geldings. They are unquestionably weaker than unmutilated males; but they are more tractable, and at all seasons ready for service. While the former are not only unmanageable, but almost furious, during the rutting season, which lasts forty days, and returns annually in the spring. It is then said, that they foam... Camelus continually, and that one or two red vesicles, as large as a hog's bladder, issue from their mouths. In this season they eat little, attack and bite animals, and even their own masters, to whom at all other times they are very submissive. Their mode of copulating differs from that of all other quadrupeds; for the female, instead of standing, lies down on her knees, and receives the male in the same position that she reposest, or is loaded. This posture, to which the animals are early accustomed, becomes natural, since they allume it spontaneously in coition. The time of gestation is near twelve months, and, like all large quadrupeds, the females bring forth only one at a birth. Her milk is copious and thick; and, when mixed with a large quantity of water, affords an excellent nourishment to men. The females are not obliged to labour, but are allowed to pasture and produce at full liberty. The advantage derived from their produce and their milk is perhaps superior to what could be drawn from their working. In some places, however, most of the females are castrated, in order to fit them for labour; and it is alleged, that this operation, instead of diminishing, augments their strength, vigour, and plumpness. In general, the fatter camels are, they are the more capable of enduring great fatigue. Their bunches seem to proceed from a redundancy of nourishment; for, during long journeys, in which their conductor is obliged to halve their food, and where they often suffer much hunger and thirst, these bunches gradually diminish, and become so flat, that the place where they were is only perceptible by the length of the hair, which is always longer on these parts than on the rest of the back. The meagreness of the body augments in proportion as the bunches decrease. The Moors, who transport all articles of merchandise from Barbary and Numidia, as far as Ethiopia, set out with their camels well laden, which are very fat and vigorous; and bring back the same animals so meagre, that they commonly sell at a low price to the Arabs of the Desert, to be again fattened.

We are told by the ancients, that camels are in a condition for propagating at the age of three years. This assertion is suspicious; for, in three years, they have not acquired one half of their growth. The penis of the male, like that of the bull, is very long, and very slender. During erection, it stretches forward, like that of all other quadrupeds; but, in its ordinary state, the sheath is drawn backward, and the urine is discharged from between the hind legs; so that both males and females urine in the same manner. The young camel sucks his mother twelve months; but, when meant to be trained, in order to render him strong and robust in the chase, he is allowed to suck and pasture at freedom during the first years, and is not loaded, or made to perform any labour, till he is four years old. He generally lives forty and sometimes fifty years, which duration of life is proportioned to the time of his growth. There is no foundation for what has been advanced by some authors, that he lives one hundred years.

By considering, under one point of view, all the qualities of this animal, and all the advantages derived from him, it must be acknowledged that he is the most useful creature subjected to the service of man. Gold and silk constitute not the true riches of the East. The camel is the genuine treasure of Asia. He is more valuable than the elephant; for he may be said to perform an equal quantity of labour at a twentieth part of the expense. Besides, the whole species are under subjection to man, who propagates and multiplies them at pleasure. But he has no such dominion over the elephants, whom he cannot multiply, and the individuals of whom he conquers with great labour and difficulty. The camel is not only more valuable than the elephant, but is perhaps equal in utility to the horse, the ass, and the ox, when their powers are united. He carries as much as two mules; though he eats as little, and feeds upon herbs equally coarse as the ass. The female furnishes milk longer than the cow. The flesh of a young camel is as good and wholesome as veal: The Africans and Arabs fill their pots and tubs with it, which is fried with grease, and preserved in this manner during the whole year for their ordinary repasts: The hair is finer and more in request than the best wool. Even their excrements are useful: for sal ammoniac is made of their urine; and their dung, dried in the sun and pulverized, serves for litter to themselves, as well as to horses, with which people frequently travel in countries where no hay or straw can be had. In fine, their dung makes excellent fuel, which burns freely, and gives as clear and nearly as hot a flame as dry wood, which is of great use in the deserts, where not a tree is to be found, and where, for want of combustible materials, fire is as scarce as water.

3. The Glama, Llama, or South-American camel-sheep, has an almost even back, small head, fine black eyes, and very long neck, bending much, and very protuberant near the junction with the body: in a tame state, with smooth short hair; in a wild state, with long coarse hair, white, grey, and russet, disposed in spots; with a black line from the head along the top of the back to the tail, and belly white. The spotted may possibly be the tame, the last the wild, llamas. The tail is short; the height from four to four feet and a half; the length from the neck to the tail, six feet. The carcase divested of skin and offals, according to the editor of Mr Byron's voyage, weighed 200lb. In general, the shape exactly resembles a camel, only it wants the dorsal bunch. It is the camel of Peru and Chili; and, before the arrival of the Spaniards, was the only beast of burden known to the Indians. It is very mild, gentle, and tractable. Before the introduction of mules, they were used by the Indians to plough the land: at present they serve to carry burdens of about 100lb. They go with great gravity; and, like their Spanish masters, nothing can prevail upon them to change their pace. They lie down to the burden; and when wearied, no blows can provoke them to go on. Teuille says, they are so capricious, that if struck, they instantly squat down, and nothing but carelessness can make them arise. When angry, they have no other method of revenging their injuries than by spitting; and they can ejaculate their saliva to the distance of ten paces: if it falls on the skin, it raises an itching and a reddish spot. Their flesh is eaten, and is said to be as good as mutton. The wool has a strong disagreeable scent. They are very sure-footed; therefore used to carry the Peruvian ores over the rugged hills and narrowest paths of the Andes. They inhabit inhabit that vast chain of mountains their whole length to the straits of Magellan; but except where these hills approach the sea, as in Patagonia, never appear on the coasts. Like the camel, they have powers of abstaining long from drink, sometimes for four or five days: like that animal, their food is coarse and trifling.

In a wild state, they keep in great herds in the highest and steepest parts of the hills; and while they are feeding, one keeps sentry on the pinnacle of some rock: if it perceives the approach of any one, it neighs; the herd takes the alarm, and goes off with incredible speed. They outrun all dogs, so there is no other way of killing them but with the gun. They are killed for the sake of their flesh and hair; for the Indians weave the last into cloth. From the form of the parts of generation in both sexes, no animal copulates with such difficulty. It is often the labour of a day, antequama aitum ipsum venerum incipiant, et abfolvant.

4. The Pacos, or sheep of Chili, has no bunch on the back. It is covered with a fine valuable wool, which is of a rote red colour on the back of the animal, and white on the belly. They are of the same nature with the preceding; inhabit the same places, but are more capable of supporting the rigour of frost and snow: they live in vast herds; are very timid, and excessively swift. The Indians take the pacos in a strange manner: they tie cords with bits of cloth or wool hanging to them, above three or four feet from the ground, crows the narrow pastures of the mountains, then drive those animals towards them, which are so terrified by the flutter of the rags, as not to dare to pass, but, huddling together, give the hunters an opportunity to kill with their flings as many as they please. The tame ones will carry from 50 to 75 lbs; but are kept principally for the sake of the wool and the flesh, which is exceedingly well tasted.