542 FAMILY PHOCID.S. 



the i dogs/ as the Seals are called in Greenland parlance, with 

 ropes to the ship, where the so-called doctor (or barber) receives 

 them, counting them as soon as they come in at ihe Flenssgat.* 

 The rest of the animal, termed the 'krang', remains on the ice, 

 a booty to the birds and the Polar Bear. The success of the Seal- 

 hunt depends upon quickly taking advantage of the favorable 

 moment. The crew must be constantly quick of hand. Five 

 hundred to six hundred Seals may be killed in a day by a crew 

 of a ship of 180 tons. The difficulty experienced by the men 

 in springing from ice-cake to ice-cake to reach the ship again, 

 is not slight. 



" Hunting from boats or vessels is comfortable, and is pre- 

 ferred when there is much open water. They spring from the 

 boats to the ice-floes, kill the Seals in the same way, take them 

 temporarily into the boat and stack them on the first suitable 

 ice-floe. The removal of the skins from the fat is made by the 

 officers on shipboard as opportunity may favor. In this work, 

 following an old Dutch custom, they stand in a row to take 

 'a little' ("ein 'Llitjer' genommeu"),! and occasionally divert 

 themselves with a song. The skins are fastened by hooks to a 

 wooden frame, and the fat is quickly removed and thrown into 

 tubs. The coopers then pack the fat in casks or iron tanks in 

 the lower or middle holds of the vessel. The art of properly 

 removing the fat without injury to the skins is not easy to 

 acquire, and upon this depends in a high degree the value of 

 the skins. I hear that the owner of the 'Albert ' has, through 

 a slight modification of the share-money, interested the men in 

 exercising the greatest possible care in removing the skins, 

 in order to secure a good result. The skins are salted, again 

 counted and laid away. By the end of April the proper Seal- 

 hunt is over. Old Seals are rarely to be obtained, they being 

 very watchful ; however, the crews of the Norwegian ships are 

 excellent marksmen, and by them many are shot. The value 

 of a young Seal (fat and skin) is 2 to 3 thalers, while the old 

 ones are worth twice this sum.":}: 



* Opening in the side of a whaling-vessel through which the blubber is 

 taken on board in cutting up a whale. 



t " On such occasions the Dutch drunk schnapsfrorn cup's. On many Dutch 

 ships it was the custom ( ' Brauch ' ) or much more the bad custom ( ' Miss- 

 brauch') to take the schnaps-bottle into the boat with them, or hang it by 

 a line from the ship." 



t Translated from Petennann's Geog. Mitth., Ergauzungsheft No. 26, 1869, 

 pp. 81, 82. 



