Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 1 (1876).djvu/195

 straw, straps, leather, &c., &c. Ours once ate up some gloves and a leathern saddle belonging to our Cossacks; and the Mongols told me of camels which had been without food for a long while, and which devoured an old tent of their master's in the coolest manner possible. They will even eat meat and fish; ours stole meat we had hung up to dry; one voracious brute actually made off with the birdskins ready for stuffing, and relished dried fish and the remains of the dogs' food; but this was a singular instance, and his eccentric tastes were not shared by the others.

Camels at pasture appease their hunger in two or three hours, after which they lie down and rest, or wander about the steppe. They cannot go without food for more than eight or ten days, nor can they go without water in spring and autumn for more than seven, requiring it in the height of summer every third or fourth day. Much, however, depends on the powers of endurance of the particular animal; the younger and fatter it is, the longer can it exist without nourishment. It only happened to us once during the whole course of the expedition, viz. in November 1870, to keep our camels without water for six consecutive days, notwithstanding which they went well; in summer they were never more than forty-eight hours without it. At this season they should be watered daily, but in spring and autumn every second or third day is quite sufficient, and in winter snow answers the same purpose.

The intelligence of camels is of a very low order;