254 EUMETOPIAS STELLERI STELLER'S SEA LION. 



lowing pages I shall borrow largely from liis excellent account 

 of its habits.* 



HABITS. Aside from Steller's early account of the northern 

 Sea Lion, little had been published relating to the habits of this 

 species prior to 1870. Now, however, with possibly one excep- 

 tion, none of our Pinnipeds is better known. 



Steller gave a very full description of the habits of the Sea 

 Bear (Callorhinus ursinus), and remarked that, with some few 

 exceptions (which he specifies), those of the Sea Lion closely 

 resemble those of that animal. Choris states: "On y [Pile 

 Saint-Georges] tue une grand quantite" de Lions Marins ; niais 

 seulement des males, a cause de leur grandeur ; on se sert de 

 leur peau pour recouvrir les canots, et des intestins pour faire 

 le kamleyki, especes de blouses que Pon endosse par-dessus les 

 autres vetements lorsqu'il pluet pour ne pas se mouiller. La 

 chair, que Poii fait se"cher, est dure ; c'est une bonne nourriture 



pour Phiver Les jeunes sont tres-tendres et ont le 



gout de poisson." 



" Le rivage etait convert de troupes iunoinbrables de lions 

 marins. L'odeur qu'ils repandent est insupportable. Ces ani- 

 inaux 6taient alors dans le temps du rut. L'on voyait de tons 



*Mr. Elliott's account was first printed in his " Report on the Pry bilov 

 Group, or Seal Islands, of Alaska," in 1873. The work is an oblong quarto 

 of about 130 pages, interleaved with about 40 photographic plates. The 

 text, however, is unpaged, and the plates are not numbered, so that it is 

 almost impossible to cite it definitely. As the edition was limited to one 

 hundred and twenty-five copies, and was privately distributed, it is almost 

 inaccessible, and can hardly be said to have been published. [*] The text, 

 however, was reprinted, in substance, in 1875, in octavo form, as one of the 

 Reports of the Treasury Department (of which Mr. Elliott was Assistant 

 Special Agent at the Fur Seal Islands), under the title "A Report upon the 

 Condition of Affairs in the Territory of Alaska." This edition is the one 

 quoted in the present work. The quarto report contains five plates devoted 

 to the Sea Lion. The first gives a nearly front view of an adult male. The 

 second shows several natives creeping along the shore in order to get be- 

 tween a herd of Sea Lions and the water to intercept their retreat. A third 

 is entitled " Capturing the Sea Lion Springing the Alarm," and indicates 

 the stage of the hunt when the hunters expose themselves to view and rush 

 upon the herd to drive them inland. A part are retreating land-ward, while 

 others are plunging precipitately into the sea. The fourth, ' ' Shooting Sea 

 Lion Bulls," represents the killing of the old males' with firearms. The 

 fifth and last depicts the slaughter of the females, and is entitled, "Spear- 

 ing Sea Lion Cows, 'The Death Whirl/" 



[*It is well known that opinions of "what constitutes publication? " differ. I have the 

 author's permission to record here my own view, which is, that a printed work is "pub- 

 lished" if a single copy is placed in a public library. ELLIOTT COTJES.] 



