14 EDWAlfD A. WILSON. 



seals, there is always a large quantity of mud, sand, and stones in the stomach, which 

 appear also in the excreta. This mud is introduced, no doubt, largely by accident in 

 collectino- the fish and crustaceans which inhabit the bottom of the shallow seas. 



Some of our seamen during the winter months would wait at the seals' blow-holes 

 with a harpoon and line, and with these even the largest Weddell's Seals could be trans- 

 fixed and landed. As they had often been feeding immediately before their capture, 

 it was possible sometimes to take ten or twelve little-damaged fish from the stomach 

 before digestion had commenced. The fish commonly obtained were species of 

 Treinatomus, Notothenia, and Gymnodraco. These seem to be as plentiful in the winter 

 as they are in the summer months, the actual temperature of the sea-water varying 

 l)ut slightly throughout the year. The mere fact that the sea is frozen at the 

 surface does not make much difference to the marine inhabitants. The average 

 temperature of the water in the winter months from April to September is just above 

 the freezing point of sea-water. Consequently there is a uniformity of temperature 

 under water during the winter, which is by no means to l)e found in the air. 

 This not only allows marine life to continue and flourish throughout the year, but 

 it also accounts for the non-migration of Weddell's Seal, and for the fact that, 

 although it is almost as abundant as in the summer in point of numbers, it is 

 not l)y any means so much in evidence. These seals, which may 1)e seen during 

 the summer lying in hundreds on the fast ice, live during the winter almost entirely in 

 the water. They find it far more comfortable to remain in water at a uniform tempera- 

 ture of 28° F. than to expose themselves to temperatures ranging from about zero to 

 - 50° or - 60° F. in the air, where wind and snowdrift would make their existence 

 infinitely less comfortalile even if the temperature itself was less severe. Therefore, 

 apart altogether from the fact that the winter months are dark and prevent seals from 

 being seen at any distance, there is no doubt that they really leave the water very 

 little and only when there is no wind and a moderate degree of cold, conditions 

 not often occurring together at the latitude of our winter quarters. Nevertheless, 

 we are certain that they were still with us in the depth of the winter, not only 

 because the blow-holes were always found open, but because we could hear their 

 signals to one another underneath the ice, and because we could actually bring them 

 out at the end of a harpoon line whenever we cared to wait for them at a blow-hole. 



Throughout the two winters spent in McMurdo Sound, in lat. 77° 50', the farthest 

 point South at which they have yet l)een recorded at any time of the year, we noted 

 every occurrence of a seal on the ice out of the water. Quite a large number were seen 

 and many more heard during the first winter, when the ice was constantly breaking up 

 in the strait to within a few miles of the ship, even so late as May 5 th, and though 

 fewer were seen in the second winter, when the open water was never nearer the ship 

 than 10 or 12 miles, there was still a considerable number with us. Consequently 

 we knew that the movements of the greater number were influenced by the 

 proximity of open water, but not to the extent of more than a mile or two, and 



