Why, he carries his own drinking water, not in the load on his back, but inside his stomach! Is not that a wonderful thing? His stomach is made differently from that of any other animal. The stomach of any other animal, Or even a man's stomach, is so made that the water drunk at any time is all used up in the next few hours; that is why any other animal, or even a man, has to have another drink after those few hours.
But a camel's stomach is so made that it has one big place for food and drink like the stomach of any other animal, but it also has many smaller places arranged all around the stomach; these smaller places are just like bottles, and are called cells.
So when a camel takes a good long drink, the big place in the middle of the stomach takes in the water first; then as he drinks more and more, the bottles or cells all around begin to get filled also. And the wonderful thing is that as soon as each cell is full, its mouth closes up by itself! In that way, if the camel drinks long enough, all the cells get full, one by one, and then have their mouths closed up.
When a camel is about to start on a long journey through the desert, he takes a very long drink, till he feels that he cannot drink any more; then he knows that all the bottles or cells inside are quite full, as well as the big place in the middle of his stomach. Now he is ready to cross the desert.
After many hours all the water in the big place in the middle of the stomach gets used up. Then what happens? Why, one of the bottles inside opens its mouth by itself, and pours the water into the stomach! And after many hours more, when that water has also been used up, the second bottle opens its mouth and pours the water into the stomach. In this way all the bottles or cells inside the camel one by one pour their water into the stomach from day to day, whenever the camel feels thirsty. Is not that most wonderful?
And there is yet another very wonderful thing about the camel. His hump! It is just as wonderful whether it is one hump or two humps. I shall tell you.
The camel's hump is his store of food! Yes, just as he carries his own drinking water inside his stomach, so he also carries his own store of food in his hump.
This is how he does it:
When the camel is quite well and strong, if he eats any food which is a little more than he actually needs for his hunger, that food after a while goes to his hump and helps to make it bigger. In this way the hump becomes a store of all the extra food that he has eaten. Then, on going on a long journey through the desert, if the camel has nothing to eat and begins to feel hungry and weak, a little of the hump is used up to give him strength, just as if he were to eat a meal. In this way he can go for many days without food, but of course his hump will get smaller and smaller.