Camel
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Camel. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
the most important domestic animal of southwestern Asia. Naturalists consider the camel the most ancient cud-chewing animal in existence--an older type than the giraffe--and place it at the end of the cud-chewing group nearest the thick-skinned animals. The camel family contains two groups. The Bactrian or two-humped camel and the Arabian or one-humped camel belong to the Old World; the llama and the alpaca, the quanaco and the vicuna of the Andes, belong to the New World. The camel's colt stands about three feet high and attains a shoulder height of about seven feet at maturity. Its duration of life is forty years or over. The camel does not refuse green pasturage, but it exceeds a goat in ability to live on the dry, prickly shrubs of the desert. Camels are wonderfully well fitted for life in hot, sandy countries. Unlike other cud-chewing animals, the camel's foot is only partially cloven. Instead of a split foot shod with two hoofs, like those of a deer or an ox, the two toes of a camel rest on a broad, leathery, elastic pad that serves as a kind of "sand shoe," and enables the camel to walk with ease over the soft sands of Arabia and the Sahara, where a hoofed animal sinks ankle deep at every step. The extreme tips of its toes are separated, and are shod with reduced hoofs much like claws. The camel's backbone is entirely regular. Its hump is not a deformity of the spine but a storehouse. When forage is plentiful, the camel stores up fat and muscle in its hump to be drawn on for strength during long journeys or time of food scarcity. During hard trips these humps become empty, and must be restored by three or four months of rest and abundance before severe service is again undertaken. Long, thick, silky eye-lashes serve as a protection against the white glare of the sand and keep out whirling dust. The camel's nostrils are long, narrow slits. During a sand storm a camel lies down, stretches out his long neck on the sand, closes his eyes and nostrils, and waits for the suffocating dust cloud to blow past. Another wonderful provision of nature is a system of folds or water pouches in the walls of the first and second stomach. The largest of these pockets is not over three inches in diameter, but they are numerous and, when filled from the stomach by a drink at some oasis, they will serve their owner at need for a journey of four or five days to the next water supply. The strength of a camel's back is proverbial. Their ordinary capacity for carrying burdens is twice that of a packhorse, and the Bactrian camel is credited with carrying 1,000 or even 1,500 pounds for short distances. Of the two camels, the Arabian is lighter and better adapted to the deep sand and extreme heat of Syria and Africa; the Bactrian is a coarser, stronger animal, better fitted for the mountain passes, stony pathways, and cold winters of central Asia. Camels are uncouth, awkward, and ill-tempered. They lack the docility of the ox, and do not possess the intelligence and the affectionate disposition of the horse; but without them large tracts of the Old World would be uninhabitable. Their milk and the flesh of the young serve the Arab for food; he uses their dung for fuel; he manufactures rugs, ropes, garments, and tents from their hair; and he uses their hide for water bags and furniture. In a land where boats are unknown and roads are impossible, the Arab carries his family and his wares on the backs of camels. Thus this faithful animal furnishes food, fuel, shelter, and transportation for millions of people. Prior to the Civil War a number of camels were imported for use in transporting army supplies in the "Great American Desert." The experiment was reported successful. Some descendants of these camels, escaping the perils of Apaches and mountain lions, are, it is said, still to be found in Arizona, but the assertion rests on doubtful authority. Camels have been introduced into the arid regions of southern and western Australia, where they are used for beasts of burden. They carry bales of wool to market. The distribution of camels, Arabia and Morocco not included, is about as follows: Russia in Europe 225,550 Spain 2,250 British India 442,301 Cyprus 11,169 Russia in Asia 678,622 Algeria 211,279 Egypt 40,000 Sudan 132,116 Tunis 147,229 German Africa 52 Australia 4,065 Total . . . . . 1,884,583 See Alpaca ; Llama ; Dromedary ; Caravan Camel's Hair, the woolly hair shorn from the neck and back of the camel. There are two distinct grades. The under hair is fine. It is about one inch long, and is soft and silky. The outer hair, which completely covers the under hair on the neck and hump, is coarse, and is from three to four inches long. In Arabia and other eastern countries, camel's hair is woven into a variety of stuffs, and forms the chief material for clothing and housing the inhabitants. The natural color is a light brown or tan, which is one of the distinguishing characteristics of genuine camel's hair goods. The fiber imported into America and Europe is used principally for the manufacture of fine dress goods and winter underwear. The long and short hairs are sometimes separated, but more frequently they are spun together. When the cloth is woven, some of these longer hairs become untwisted and appear on the surface, giving a shaggy appearance. Genuine camel's hair fabrics are rarely seen in the American market. Two varieties of so-called camel's hair cloth are common in our markets. One is a thick, shaggy fabric, retailing at about two dollars the yard. It is manufactured usually from fine sheep's wool and may or may not have long hairs interspersed on the surface. The other is a thin, fine, wool textile named from its resemblance to the imported cashmere shawls, improperly called camel's hair shawls. It is in reality an attempt to imitate the material of these shawls. See Cashmere Shawl 2026 Editor's Note: The camel entry's American footnote: the Army's 1850s Camel Corps experiment left feral camels wandering the Southwest into this entry's era — the last credible sightings came in the 1900s–30s. See Camel Corps . (Ed: BR 2026-07-16)
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a genus of ruminant quadrupeds, characterized by the absence of horns; the possession of incisive, canine, and molar teeth; a fissure in the upper lip; a long and arched neck; one or two humps or protuberances on the back; a broad elastic foot ending in two small hoofs, which does not sink readily in the sand of the desert. The native country of the camel is said to extend from Morocco to China, within a zone of 900 or 1,000 miles in breadth. The common camel (Camelus Bactrianus), having two humps, is only found in the N. part of this region, and exclusively from the ancient Bactria, now Turkestan, to China. The dromedary, or single-hump camel (Camelus dromedarius, or Arabian camel) is found throughout the entire length of this zone, on its S. side, as far as Africa and India. The Bactrian species is the larger, more robust, and more fitted for carrying heavy burdens. The dromedary has been called the race-horse of its species. To people residing in the vicinity of the great deserts the camel is an invaluable mode of conveyance. It will travel three days under a load and five days under a rider without drinking. The stronger varieties carry from 700 to 1,000 pounds burden. The camel's power of enduring thirst is partly due to the peculiar structure of its stomach, to which are attached little pouches or water cells, capable of straining off and storing up water for future use, when journeying across the desert. It can live on little food, and that of the coarsest kind, leaves of trees, nettles, shrubs, twigs, etc. In this it it is helped by the fact that its humps are mere accumulations of fat (the back-bone of the animal being quite straight) and form a store upon which the system can draw when the outside supply is defective. Hence the camel driver who is about to start journey takes care to see that the humps of his animal present a full and healthy appearance. Camels which carry heavy burdens will do about 25 miles a day; those which are used for speed alone, from 60 to 90 miles a day. The camel is rather passive than docile, showing less intelligent co-operation with its master than the horse or elephant; but it is very vindictive when injured. It lives from 40 to 50 years. Its flesh is esteemed by the Arab and its milk is his common food. The hair of the camel serves in the East for making cloth for tents, carpets, and wearing apparel. It is imported into European countries for the manufacture of fine pencils for painting and for other pur- The South American members poses. of the family Camelidæ constitute the genus Auchenia, to which the llama and alpaca belong; they have no humps.