DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.11636#0168
140
TRAVELS IN UPPER
bad employed every precaution to prevent entirely
their having any, without ceasing to be exposed to
the open air. They lived thus for twenty days :
but what kind of life ! From being plump, as they
were when I caught them, they soon became ex-
tremely thin. With their good plight, they gra-
dually lost their agility and their colours; the skin
became livid and wrinkled, it adhered close to the
bone, so that they had the appearance of being
dried before they ceased to exist.
The catacombs likewise frequently serve as a re-
treat for the jackals, which swarm in this part of
Egypt: they always march in numerous squadrons,
and roam around the habitation of man. Their
cries occasion much disturbance, especially in the
night-time ; it is a sort of yelping which may be
compared to the shrill complainings of children of
different ages. They greedily devour cadaverous
substances and the garbage on laystalls; in a word,
cruel as voracious, they are an object of apprehen-
sion even to man.
It is of the jackal that we are to understand all
that authors have said of the wolf, and even of the
fox of Africa; for, admitting that these animals
have, to a certain degree, a relation to each other, it
ishowever well known,that thcreare neitherwolves
nor foxes in that part of the world. The name
bed
TRAVELS IN UPPER
bad employed every precaution to prevent entirely
their having any, without ceasing to be exposed to
the open air. They lived thus for twenty days :
but what kind of life ! From being plump, as they
were when I caught them, they soon became ex-
tremely thin. With their good plight, they gra-
dually lost their agility and their colours; the skin
became livid and wrinkled, it adhered close to the
bone, so that they had the appearance of being
dried before they ceased to exist.
The catacombs likewise frequently serve as a re-
treat for the jackals, which swarm in this part of
Egypt: they always march in numerous squadrons,
and roam around the habitation of man. Their
cries occasion much disturbance, especially in the
night-time ; it is a sort of yelping which may be
compared to the shrill complainings of children of
different ages. They greedily devour cadaverous
substances and the garbage on laystalls; in a word,
cruel as voracious, they are an object of apprehen-
sion even to man.
It is of the jackal that we are to understand all
that authors have said of the wolf, and even of the
fox of Africa; for, admitting that these animals
have, to a certain degree, a relation to each other, it
ishowever well known,that thcreare neitherwolves
nor foxes in that part of the world. The name
bed