lines of twenty and march them abreast, but the Indian camels were generally marched four in a string, one behind the other, and thus it was difficult to close them up so as to occupy as little ground as possible. The camel is a curious sort of beast, and he gives one the impression of being in a chronic condition of low spirits. He grunts and moans in a doleful way when made to lie down or stand up, and at night gives vent to the most awful sounds, something between the roar of a bull and the grunt of a boar. As to his capabilities as a beast of burden, he is, no doubt, admirably suited to the ordinary requirements of desert travelling; but many of us thought we should have done better had we had more mules. The Indian brigade did the greater part of their own transport work with mules during the campaign, and of course we had many hundreds too, chiefly from Cyprus, and driven by natives from that island. Our ammunition column was composed almost entirely of mules. An average camel carries a load of four hundred pounds, and though an Indian camel can carry more than this, it is unadvisable ever to attempt to overload him. We found three hundred pounds quite enough for the little Berbera animals, and also for the
