kehguelen's land. 189 



party at Howes Foreland, and two others were seen there. 

 Two of the whaling schooners killed over 70 Fur Seals on one 

 day, and upwards of 20 on another, at some small islands off 

 Howes Foreland to the north. It is a pity that some discretion 

 is not exercised in killing the animals, as is done in St. Paul's 

 Island in Behring's Sea, in the case of the northern Fur Seal. By 

 killing the young males, and selecting certain animals only for 

 killing, the number of seals may even be increased.* The sealers 

 in Kerguelen's Land kill all they can find. 



The sealers told us that the southern Fur Seals sometimes eat 

 penguins, and that they had found the remains of them in their 

 stomachs. Seals feed to a very large extent on Crustacea. Thus 

 Otaria jubata is said to feed more on Crustacea and smaller fish, 

 than on large fish, and in the Campbell and Auckland Islands 

 to eat also birds,f and Mr. Brown, in his account of the habits of 

 Arctic seals and whales, says that the food of the northern seals 

 consists mostly of Crustacea, species of Gammarus, called " seals' 

 food " by the whalers 4 In summer the Northern Seals eat fish. 

 They sometimes take down birds, but not often. Dr. Buckholtz 

 found only Crustacea in the stomachs of Phoca Greenlandica in 

 the Arctic regions, mainly Gammarus Arcticus, and G. Themisto.^ 



The sealers told me, that sometimes, but very rarely, they 

 found another kind of seal, like the Fur Seal somewhat, which 

 they called the " Sea Dog." A second species of eared seal 

 probably thus occurs as a rarity at Kerguelen's Land. 



The whole beach of Christmas Harbour was covered with 

 droves of the Johnny Penguin (Pygosceles tamiata) and King 

 Penguins, and establishments of these penguins were to be seen 

 on small level grassy spaces far up the hill slope. 



* " The Eared Seals." J. A. Allen. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., Harvard 

 Univ., Cambridge, Mass., Vol. II, No. 1. 



t For an account of the habits of the Southern Sea Lion, see " Twenty 

 Months in the Campbell and Auckland Islands." Peterm. Mitt. 1866, 

 s. 103. 



+ R. Brown, " On the Mammalia of Greenland," with succeeding 

 papers on the Seals and Whales. "Proc. Zool. Soc," 1864. 



§ " y Die zweite Deutsche Nord-Polarfahrtin den Jahren 1869 und 1870," 

 2. Bd. Wissenschaftliche Ergebnisse. Leipzig, F. A. Brockhaus, 1874. 



W. Peters, " Zeugethiere und Fische." 





