There are many wild asses in the deserts of Libya and Numidia, that run with such amazing swiftness that scarce even the coursers of the country can overtake them. When they see a man, they set up a horrid braying, and stop short all together, till he approaches near them; they then, as if by common consent, fly off with great speed; and it is upon such occasions that they generally fall into the traps which are previously prepared to catch them. The natives take them chiefly upon account of their flesh, which they esteem as delicious eating, and for their skins, of which that kind of leather is made which is called shagreen." An. Nature, vol. ii. p. 24. "The Persians," says Bingley, "catch them and break them for the draught. They make pits, which they fill about half up with plants; into these the asses fall without bruising themselves, and are taken thence alive. When completely domesticated, they are very valuable, and sell at a high price, being at all times celebrated for their amazing swiftness. The food of the wild asses is the saltest plants of the deserts, such as the atriplex, kali, and chenopodium; and also the better milky tribes of herbs. They also prefer salt water to fresh. This is exactly conformable to the history given of this animal in the book of Job, for the words "barren land," expressive of his dwelling, ought, according to the learned Bochart, to be rendered salt places. The hunters generally lie in wait for the asses near the ponds of brackish water, to which they resort to drink. Penn. Quad. 3d edit. i. 12." Animal Biography, vol. ii. p. 110.

But the Israelites had not only horses and asses, but likewise MULES. The mule, properly so called, is bred by the he-ass and the mare, when between the horse and the she-ass it is called a hinney. See Bingley's British Quad. p. 444. "Neither mules, nor any other mongrel animals," says Brown," are capable of procreation, God having wisely so ordered, to prevent the filling of the world with monsters. The Jewish law expressly prohibited every attempt to confound the species of animals." Levit. xix. 19. "Some have pretended, that ANAH, the Horite," (Genesis xxxvi. 24.) "was inventor of the unnatural manner of gendering mules; but we have supposed the text to have another meaning. It is certain there were plenty of mules in the time of David. He and his sons rode on mules, 2 Sam. xiii. 29. xviii. 9. Solomon rode upon one at his coronation, and procured a considerable number of them, 1 Kings i. 33, 38. x. 25. Ahab had vast numbers of them,

1 Kings xviii. 5. Naaman had several of them in his train," 2 Kings v. 17. The people of Togarmah sold numbers of them to the Tyrians, Ezek. xxvii. 14. The Jews had 245 of them to bear their furniture from Babylon, Ezra ii. 66." "The Persians used them for their posts to ride on, Esth. viii. 10. They are still much used in several countries, where the ways are hard and rocky. Great numbers of them are kept about the Alps, on the north of Italy, and the Pyrenean mountains, between France and Spain. These mules are generally black, well limbed, and mostly bred of Spanish mares. Some of them are 15 or 16 hands high. They are much stronger, hardier, and surer footed than a horse, and will live and work the double of their age: they are light, and fit for riding, but gallop rough."

The CAMEL and the DROMEDARY were both in use among the Israelites. Abraham and Jacob both had camels, (Gen. xii. 16. xxiv. 19, 44. xxx. 43. xxxi. 34.) Job had 3000 in his first prosperity, and 6000 in his second; and the Reubenites took from the Hagarites 50,000; and it appears, from 1 Kings iv. 28, that Solomon had dromedaries. Authors, however, seem to be divided in the distinction between them. Brown says, "There are four kinds of camels: (1) The camel with two hairy bunches on its back, which is principally produced about the east of Persia, and will bear 1300 weight. Of this kind the king of Persia, in 1676, had 7000; of which the Tartars carried off 3000. This is by some falsely called the dromedary." (2) "The camel with one bunch, which is chiefly used in Arabia and the north of Africa. The most handsome of this kind is the dromedary, which is of rounder shape, and has a lesser bunch than the others, is able to carry a far less burden, but is of prodigious swiftness, said, by the Arabs, to run as far in one day as their best horses will do in nine, and so chiefly used for riding, 1 Kings iv. 28. Esther viii. 10. (3) The Peruvian camel, whose back is even, and its breast bunchy. (4) The Pacos, which has no bunch at all." Cruden, however, reverses them, and calls that the camel which has but one bunch, and that the dromedury which has two. Under the word DROMEDARY, he says it is a sort of camel; it is called dromedary from the Greek dremo, I run, by reason of its running very swiftly. Dromedaries are smaller than common camels, slenderer, and more nimble. Upon their backs they have a kind of natural saddle, which is composed of a great deal of hair, that stands up, and forms as it were a large bunch. In eastern countries, when persons would go any where with speed,

66

they generally make use of dromedaries. It is said, that they can go an hundred miles in a day with them, nay, it is affirmed, that there are some which will travel an hundred and fifty miles in a day. There are two sorts of dromedaries, one of a larger kind, with two bunches upon its back; the other lesser, with only one. Both are very common in the western parts of Asia, such as Syria and Arabia. That which hath but one bunch upon its back, is commonly called camel, the other is named dromedary. They are both capable of very great fatigues; their hair is soft and shorn, but about the middle of their backs, camels have a little eminence covered with hair a foot high upon their bunch, and dromedaries have two bunches, and two eminences of hair, which however are very small; and if it be rightly considered, dromedaries and camels are no more bunch-backed than other animals." Goldsmith again, under "The Camel and the Dromedary," says, "These names do not make two distinct kinds, but are only given to a variety of the same animal, which has, however, subsisted time immemorial. The principal, and perhaps the only sensible difference, by which these two races are distinguished, consists in this, that the camel has two bunches upon his back, whereas the dromedary has but one; the latter, also, is neither so large nor so strong as the camel. These two races, however, produce with each other, and the mixed breed formed between them is considered the best, the most patient, and the most indefatigable of all the kind. Of the two varieties, the dromedary is by far the most numerous; the camel being scarcely found, except in Turkey, and the countries of the Levant; while the other is found spread over all the deserts of Arabia, the southern parts of Africa, Persia, Tartary, and a great part of the eastern Indies." (Animated Nature, vol. iii. p. 5.) In the plates, however, to my edition of Goldsmith, which is that printed at York in 1804, the animal with two bunches is called the dromedary, and that with one the camel. Bewick, both in his cuts and in his text, reverses these; and Mr. Bingley, whom I should in general consider as the later and better authority, under "The Camel Tribe," says, "The number of species hitherto described is seven, of which only two are found on the old continent, in Asia and Africa, the rest being confined to the alpine countries of Chili and Peru. In a wild state they are supposed to be gregarious, and to associate together in vast herds. The females have each two teats, and seldom produce more than one young one at a birth. The hair of these animals is of a soft and

silky texture, and their flesh forms a very palatable food." He afterwards dwells upon "The Arabian Camel," the synonyms, of which are "Camelus Dromedarius, Linn. Dromedaire, Buff-Dromedary, Smellie.-Arabian or onebunched camel, Penn.-Shaw's Gen. Zool. ii. tab. 166. Bew. Quad. p. 140, and says, "This species is chiefly found in a wild state in the deserts of Arabia and Africa, and in the temperate parts of Asia. It is that with a single bunch on its back, which we so frequently see exhibited in the streets in this country." An. Biog. vol. ii. p. 1, 2. Amid this contrariety of opinion, it may be remarked, in respect to the camel and the dromedary of scripture, that, as the animal with one bunch seems to be the swift animal, that must be the dromedary, Esther viii. 10. Jerem. ii. 23. or Arabian camel; and the other, probably with the two bunches, the strong and steady, but slow traveller, was the camel of Abraham, Jacob, and the Ishmaelitish merchants, Gen. xxxvii. 25.

Though the camel chews the cud, yet, as the division of the feet was not complete, it was marked out by the law as unclean. It may be said in general to be about the size of a horse. The neck and legs are long and slender. When it lifts up its head, it is very high. The ears are short, and the feet broad and very sure. The tail is about a foot long. Some of them, notwithstanding they are of great heat of constitution, can live without water four or five days, and some say nine, or even twelve days. They feed in old ruins, and in dry and barren places, on nettles, thorns, thistles, and heath, and remain abroad all winter, except when they shelter themselves amidst old ruins, Ezek. xxv. 5., and are not so much afraid of any thing as mires, into which they are apt to plunge, and hardly recover themselves. They travel little more than two miles in an hour. See Brown. The dry food of dromedaries among the Israelites, and most probably of the camels likewise, was straw and barley, 1 Kings iv. 28.

Goldsmith says, "This animal alone seems to comprise within itself a variety of qualities, any one of which serves to render other quadrupeds absolutely necessary for the welfare of man; like the elephant, it is manageable and tame; like the horse, it gives the rider security; it carries greater burdens than the ox or the mule; and its milk is furnished in as great abundance as that of the cow; the flesh of the young ones is supposed to be as delicate as veal; their hair is more beautiful, and more in request than wool;

66

while even of its very excrements, no part is useless."- 'Of the urine, sal ammoniac is made; of the dung, litter for the horses, and fire for the purpose of dressing their victuals," (p. 10.) and from which ammonia is likewise obtained. Camel's milk is nourishing, and mixed with water makes a principal part of the beverage of the Arabians." The humps upon the back grow large in proportion as the animal is well fed, and, if examined, they will be found composed of a substance not unlike the udder of a cow." Dr. Clarke, speaking of the Wahabees, one of the tribes of the Arabs, says, "The Wahabees were, for the greater part, mounted upon she-camels, whose milk afforded, in the desert, subsistence to themselves and to the few horses that accompanied them. Their strength was between six and seven thousand." Vol. ii. 4to. p. 493.

Dr. Campbell, in a note, in his translation of the Gospels, on John's raiment of camel's hair," (Mat. iii. 4.) says, "His raiment was not made of the fine hair of that animal, whereof an elegant kind of cloth is made, which is thence called camlet, (in imitation of which, though made of wool, is the English camlet,) but of the long and shaggy hair of camels, which is in the East manufactured into a coarse stuff, anciently worn by monks and anchorites. It is only when understood in this way, that the word suits the description here given of John's manner of life. Burder, vol. ii. p. 293.

P.

Address delivered by James Montgomery, Esq. at a Public Meeting for the Purpose of Establishing a Literary and Philosophical Society in Sheffield.

"Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen,-I move that, in conformity with the views expressed in the antecedent resolution, an association be now formed, for the promotion of Polite Literature and Science, under the title of the "Sheffield Literary and Philosophical Society." Though I am not a native of Sheffield, I have been longer an inhabitant of the town than the majority of those who were born in it. Having lived here the full average of human life, and having spent the greatest, and what ought to have been the best, part of mine in this neighbourhood, I should be guilty of the deepest ingratitude, if I felt not as much affection towards her who