CAMEL (kam'el), Web. labor, burden bearing); Hebrew and Syriac.
1. Names and Description. There arc three principal names in Eastern history of the gent]. Camelus, as constituted by modern naturalists. In this arrangement it comprises two species positively distinct, but still possessing the com mon characters of being ruminants without horns, without muzzle, with nostrils forming oblique slits, the upper lip divided and separately movable and extensile. the soles of the feet horny with two toes covered by unguiculat•d claws. the limbs long, the abdomen drawn up, and the neck, long and slender, is bent down and up, the re verse of that of a horse, which is arched. Camels have thirty-six teeth in all, whereof three cuspi date on each side above, six incisors. and two cuspidate on each side below. which, though dif ferently named, still have all more or less the character of tushes. They have callosities on the breastbone and or the flexures of the joints Of the four stomachs. which they have in common with other animals chewing the cud, the veil triculus, or paunch, is provided with membranous cells to contain an extra provision of water, ena bling the species to subsist for four or more days without drinking. But when in the desert the camel has the faculty of smelling it afar off, and then, breaking through all control, he rushes on ward to drink, stirring the element previously with a fore-foot, until quite muddy. Camels are temperate animals, being fed on a march only once in twenty-four hours with about a pound weight of dates, beans, or barley, and are enabled in the wilderness, by means of their long, flexible necks, and strong cuspidate teeth, to snap as they pass at thistles and thorny plants, mimosas and caper trees.
They are appropriately called the ships of the desert, having to cross regions where no vegeta tion whatever is met with, and where they could not be enabled to continue their march but for the aid of the double or single hunch on the back, which, being composed of muscular fibre and cellular substance highly adapted for the accumu lation of fat, swells in proportion as the animal is healthy and well fed. or sinks by absorption
as it supplies the want of sustenance under fa tigue and scarcity; thus giving an extra stock of food without eating. till by exhaustion the skin of the prominences, instead of standing up, falls over, and hangs like empty bags on the side of the dorsal ridge. To these endowments are added a lofty stature and great agility; eyes that dis cover minute objects at a distance: a sense of smelling of prodigious acuteness—ever kept in a state of sensibility by the animal's power of clos ing the nostrils to exclude the acrid particles of the sandy deserts; a spirit, moreover, of pa tience, not the result of fear, but of forbearance, carried to the length of self-sacrifice in the prac tice of obedience; a dense wool, to avert the solar heat and nightly cold, while on the animal, and to clothe and lodge his master when manufactured. Without the existence of the camel immense por tions of the surface of the earth would be unin habitable and even impassable. Surely the Arabs are right: 'Job's beast is a monument of God's mercy.' 2. Different Kinds. The two species arc: (1) Bactrian. The Bactrian camel (camclus Bactrianus of authors) is large and robust ; natur ally with two hunches, and originally a native of the highest tablelands of Central Asia, where even now wild individuals may be found. The species extends through China, Tartary and Russia and is principally imported across the mountains into Asia Nlinor. Syria and Persia. It is also this species which constitutes the brown Taous variety of single-hunched Turkish or Toorkee camels commonly seen at Constantinople, there being a very ancient practice among breeders of extirpat ing with a knife the foremost hunch of the animal soon after birth, thereby procuring mare space for the pack-saddle and load. It seems that this mode of rendering the Bactrian cross-breed similar to the Arabian camel or dromedary is one of the principal causes of the confusion and contradic tions which occur in the descriptions of the two species.