OR SEA-ELEPHANT. 151 



ing to the end of September, without shifting their place, or 

 taking any kind of nourishment during all that time. Forster 

 relates the same circumstance; and adds, that towards the lat- 

 ter end of their fast, when they have become extremely ema- 

 ciated, they swallow a considerable quantity of stones, to 

 keep their stomachs distended. The growth of the young is 

 extremely rapid; at the end of eight days it weighs lOOlbs. 

 So considerable an increase can only take place at the expense 

 of the parent, for she does not repair by any kind of food the 

 loss of the nutritious substance which she has supplied. Hence 

 she visibly grows lean ; some have even been observed to pe- 

 rish during this painful lactation ; but it is, of course, uncer- 

 tain whether an internal malady might not have been the cause. 

 14 At the end of fifteen days the milk teeth appear, and are 

 completed in four months. The stages of growth follow so 

 rapidly, that in three years the young animals have acquired 

 a length of from eighteen to five and twenty feet, which is the 

 ordinary limit of their growth in this direction ; they after- 

 wards increase only in breadth. At this period the young 

 males first acquire the proboscis. 



" At the age of six or seven weeks the young ones are con- 

 ducted to the water ; the shores are then abandoned for some 

 time, the whole herd row together, if we may so express our- 

 selves. The manner of swimming of these mammalia is rather 

 slow ; they are forced, at very short intervals, to come to the 

 surface of the water to breathe the air, which is essential to 

 their existence. It is observed that when any of the young 

 seals separate from the herd, they are immediately pursued by 

 some of the old ones, who compel them, by biting, to return 

 to the family group. 



u After having remained three weeks or a month at sea, both 

 to familiarize the young ones with that element, and to repair 

 the powers that have been exhausted by a long abstinence, 

 the sea- elephants return a second time to the shore, and the 

 work of reproduction recommences. 



" At this period the males have furious and bloody combats, 

 but always individual against individual. Their manner of 

 fighting is remarkable. The two colossal rivals drag them- 

 selves heavily along; they meet, muzzle to muzzle ; they raise 

 the whole of the fore-part of the body on their flippers ; they 

 open wide their enormous mouth; their eyes are inflamed 

 with fury : thus prepared, they drive themselves furiously 

 against each other, and falling together with the shock, teeth 

 to teeth, and jaw to jaw, they reciprocally inflict severe la- 

 cerations ; sometimes the eyes are torn out of their sockets 

 In this conflict ; still more frequently they loose their tusks ; 



