6o2 CARNIVORA 



Although the members of this subfamily swim and dive 

 with the greatest ease, often remaining as much as a quarter of 

 an hour or more beloAv the surface, and are dependent for 

 their sustenance entirely on living prey captured in the water, 

 } T et they frequently resort to sandy beaches, rocks, or ice-floes, 

 either to sleep or to bask in the sun, and especially for the purpose 

 of bringing forth their young. The latter appears to be the 

 universal habit, and, strange as it may seem, the young seals — of 

 some species at least — take to the water at first very reluctantly, 

 and have actually to be taught to swim by their parents. The 

 number of young produced is usually one annually, though 

 occasionally two. They are at first covered with a coat of very 

 thick, soft, nearly white fur, and until it falls off they do not 

 usually enter the water. This occurs in the Greenland and Gray 

 Seal when from two to three weeks old, but in the Common Seal 

 apparently much earlier. One of this species born in the London 

 Zoological Gardens had shed its infantile woolly coat and was 

 swimming and diving about in its pond within three hours after its 

 birth. The movements of the true Seals upon the ground or ice 

 are very different from those of the Eared-Seals. Thus the hinder 

 limbs (by which mainly they propel themselves through the water) 

 are on land always perfectly passive, stretched backwards, with the 

 soles of the feet applied to each other, and often raised to avoid 

 contact with the ground. Sometimes the fore limbs are equally 

 passive, being placed close to the sides of the body, and motion i> 

 then effected by a shuffling or wriggling action produced by the 

 muscles of the trunk. When, however, there is any necessity for 

 a more rapid mode of progression the animals use the fore paws, 

 either alternately or simultaneously, pressing the palmar surface 

 on the ground and lifting and dragging the body forwards in a 

 succession of short jumps. In this way they manage to move so 

 fast that a man has to step out beyond a walk to keep up with 

 them ; but such rapid action costs considerable effort, and they 

 very soon become heated and exhausted. These various modes of 

 progression appear to be common to all species so far as has been 

 observed. 



Most kinds of Seals are gregarious and congregate, especially at 

 the breeding season, in immense herds. Such is the habit of the 

 (heenland Seal [Phocn grwnlandka), which resorts in the spring to 

 the ice-floes of the North Sea, around Jan Mayen Island, where 

 about 200,000 are killed annually by the crews of the Scotch, 

 Dutch, and Norwegian sealing vessels. Others, like the Common 

 ■Seal of the British islands (P. vitulina), though having a wide 

 geographical range, are never met with in such large numbers or 

 far away from land. This species is stationary all the year round, 

 but some have a regular season of migration, moving south in 



