Camels, as well as elephants, lie down, so as to bring their stomachs to the ground, while receiving or discharging their burthens. At such moments, the former are extremely irritable; snarling, and watching the opportunity for biting. To say the best of these animals, they are never to be trusted, their dispositions being, for the most part, sanguinary and treacherous, although they are not carnivorous, being fed chiefly on gram, and chaff of various kinds: a camel, like the bull-dog, rarely lets go his hold.
The expence of maintaining a camel may be averaged at about four or five rupees monthly, exclusive of its portion of the surwan’s (i.e. the driver’s) wages: the large crook saddle, with its jolah, or canvas trappings, and its saleetah, or canvas sheet made of tawt, for the purpose of lading tents, and especially for bringing in chaff, may be averaged, for wear and tear, at about a rupee monthly. From this it will be seen, that if a surwan, attending three camels, should receive six rupees for pay, and that each of the camels should cost six more, the whole expence, amounting to twenty-four rupees per mensem, would fall far short of that incurred by one elephant.
The advantages attendant upon an elephant, are, that the load is all carried compact and entire; that he can travel in swampy districts, where no other animal could proceed at all; and that he is serviceable to ride upon, and to join in the line to beat hogs, and other game, out of heavy covers. On the other hand, a camel will travel on those dry soils which destroy an elephant’s feet, without sustaining the smallest injury; he is more patient under heat, and the absence both of fodder and of water; his prime cost is considerably less; his maintenance cheaper; and, where a division of carriage becomes necessary, one camel may be sent off, while the others are retained. But camels rarely thrive if exposed during the rains; hence, it is customary to build sheds for their reception during that season: this, however, is done at a very trifling expence, and might, doubtless, be dispensed with altogether, at least in the upper provinces, if young animals were to be purchased that had never been so domesticated. Few gentlemen retain their camels while serving near the Presidency, where fodder is at a most enormous price, and where the mange commonly attacks within a few weeks after arrival.
The heavy, awkward, and apparently slow, gait of the camel, generally induces to a belief that its rate of travelling is disadvantageous, inasmuch as it may denote inability to keeping up with the generality of elephants. This, however, is a great mistake, for it is very common to see the latter, when in the least over-burthened, or when the weather is hot, or the road sandy, very late in arriving at their destination; whereas, the camel, under an appropriate load, will move on at a regular pace, generally making a distance of seven feet, as I have repeatedly ascertained, from the centre of that spot whence it lifts a foot, to where it again sets it down: few elephants do so much; they walk quicker, but their strides are rarely so extensive.
The propensity of a camel to stale, so soon as eased of his burthen, renders it indispensably necessary to drive him to a distance so soon as the tent is off his back; otherwise, the urinous stench attached to the spot would render it very unpleasant, or, rather, insupportable. The native chemists extract large quantities of ammonia from those stands where camels have been kept for many weeks.
The greatest inconvenience attached to a camel is his utter inability to swim across a river, such as any other animal would consider no impediment. It is true, that, occasionally, camels may have been seen to swim for a few yards, but, in general, they turn upon the side, and, unless instantly rescued, would infallibly be drowned. Perhaps this arises from the general roundness of their bodies, which are very easily acted upon by the super-incumbent weight of the neck and head, that become levers, not sufficiently opposed by their almost fleshless limbs. Some camels enter with readiness into ferry-boats, even of the rudest construction, while others require to be urged by the display of fire in their rear, or even by the actual cautery! When once on board, they are generally quiet, but do not seem to entertain such a dread of their insulated situation as horses do.
In this particular, the elephant has a most decided superiority: he enters the water with alacrity, and, guided by the mohout, who preserves his seat on the animal’s neck, until the latter may, by way of frolic, descend to walk on the bottom, keeping, at the same time, the end of his proboscis above water, makes his way to the opposite bank, though perhaps a mile distant. If there be occasional shallows, whereon he can refresh himself, two or three miles are passed with equal facility.
In their wild state, elephants cross very large rivers in herds; the young ones swimming by the sides of their mothers, which, occasionally, support their gigantic calves by means of their trunks, either passed under the body, or slightly hooked in with the young one’s proboscis. When domesticated, elephants lose much of their natural energy in every instance; and, in lieu of viewing a tiger without fear, gradually become so timid, as to be dreadfully agitated at the sight, or smell, even of a dead one: hence, in tiger-hunting, those elephants which are more recently taken from the keddahs, provided they be sufficiently trained to be safe in other respects, are usually best suited to the sport, and afford their riders a better chance of success.
Those who cannot afford, or who consider it unnecessary, to retain either an elephant, or camels, usually purchase, or hire, bullocks, when about to march to any station not very remote. Some, indeed, prefer them altogether; but, after having given them more than one trial, both from necessity, and from the persuasions of others, my mind is made up to the full conviction, that, although rarely costing more than sixteen or twenty rupees each, (that is, from forty to fifty shillings,) they are the most tardy, the most troublesome, and the most expensive, of all the beasts of burthen in question!
Knowing, from dear-bought experience, that a bullock which can carry five maunds is a rara avis of its kind, I was much surprized to find, in Mr. Colebrooke’s little treatise on the Husbandry of Bengal, an assertion, that the enormous ‘load of 500lb. of cotton is generally carried from Nagpore to Mirzapore, a distance which, by the shortest route, exceeds four hundred miles, in journies of eight or ten miles daily.’ That some remarkably fine cattle are bred in the Nagpore district is well known; but I should have greatly doubted, under any other than the highly respectable authority alluded to, whether it would be possible to select, in all Bengal, a sufficient number of bullocks, bred in the country, to carry on the extensive trade between Nagpore and Mirzapore, under the circumstance of carrying 500lb. as an ordinary load.