524 FAMILY PHOCDXSS. 



among other methods, the use of the net. The net, he says, is 

 from sixty to ninety feet in length, and twelve meshes, or about 

 six feet, deep. It is made of linen yarn, spun from good hemp, as 

 coarse as strong sail-yarn, except the lower meshes, which are 

 made from poor hemp, so that when a Seal enters the net and 

 begins to press against it, the lower meshes, if entangled among 

 stones, will easily tear out, and the Seal, feeling the net yield 

 before him, will not turn about and go out. The net is provided 

 with floats of charred fir- wood, pointed at both ends, flattened 

 beneath and rounded above, and about a foot long. These are 

 placed about a foot apart along the upper edge of the net, to 

 which they are firmly bound.* The nets are set in the autumn, 

 from Bartholomew's day till the ice closes, and are used for the 

 capture of what he calls the Bay Sea-Calf, which is doubtless 

 the common Harbor Seal (Phoca vitulina). In setting the nets 

 two are commonly fastened together, and are placed near rocks 

 to which the Seals are known to resort. One end of the net 

 is usually fastened by a small cord to a large stone, which is 

 placed on the Seal Eock, the other end of the net being kept in 

 place by an anchor formed of large stones sunk in the water. 

 When the Seal enters the net, thinking to scramble upon the 

 rocks, he immediately thrusts his head through some of the 

 meshes ; when he finds the net hanging loosely in the water, he 

 winds himself about in it, believing he is still free, but in turn 

 ing about to go back he finds his head again through another 

 mesh at the other end of the net, whereupon he thus draws the 

 net around him, and so becomes completely wound up in it, and 

 is held a prisoner by the anchor-stone and line till morning, 

 when he is killed. The nets are placed only where the Seal 

 Eocks lie to the leeward of the land, off rocky points or islands. 

 If the rocks lie to the northward, the nets are laid when the 

 wind is south, and not when it is north, for the Seal seeks the 

 sheltered side where the sea is smooth. 



Mr. Lloyd, in his " Game Birds and Wild Fowl of Sweden 

 and Norway" (pp. 420-424), who gives an illustration of the 

 "Stand-Nat" from Eosted (1. c., p. 420), states that the way of 

 setting the net varies, the net being sometimes placed near a 

 "Skal-Steu" (Seal Eock), and at other times "across a narrow 

 strait, leading to a bay or inlet of the sea that is resorted to by 



* A shorter and somewhat earlier description of the Seal net is given by 

 Linne', in his history of his journey through Oelaiid and Gothland, in 1741. 

 See the German translation, Halle, 1704, p. 221. 



