When lamas get weary, it is
said they will stop, and scarcely any severity can compel them to go on.
Some of the accounts of these singular animals represent them as having
a bad trick of _spitting_, when they do not like their treatment. In
this respect, they resemble a great many strange sort of men I have met
with on our side of the equator, who will spit from morning till night,
sometimes on the carpet, too, on account of a very nauseous weed they
have in their mouths--with this difference, however, that the lamas spit
when they are displeased only, and the men spit all the time.
Some one who has been familiar with the animal in South America, and who
has seen it a great deal in use among the Indians there, presents a very
interesting account of its nature and habits. He says, "The lama is the
only animal associated with man, and undebased by the contact. The lama
will bear neither beating nor ill treatment. They go in troops, an
Indian going a long distance ahead as a guide. If tired, they stop, and
the Indian stops also. If the delay is great, the Indian, becoming
uneasy toward sunset, resolves on supplicating the beasts to resume
their journey. If the lamas are disposed to continue their course, they
follow the Indian in good order, at a regular pace, and very fast, for
their legs are very long; but when they are in ill-humor, they do not
even turn their heads toward the speaker, but remain motionless,
standing or lying down, and gazing on heaven with looks so tender, so
melancholy, that we might imagine these singular animals had the
consciousness of a happier existence.
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