ANIMALS RECENTLY EXTINCT. 



615 



ample of how little knowledge we may have of an animal whose exist- 

 ence has been known lor centuries, and whose habitat is neither inac- 

 cessible nor far from the habitations of civilized man. Thus, though 

 the discovery of this seal is almost coeval with the discovery of Amer- 

 ica, up to 1880 but a single specimen had fallen into the hands of nat- 

 uralists, although for many years the animal must have been common 

 in various portions of the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico, its range 

 being from the Bahamas to the Gulf of Campeche. This very abun- 

 dance was, however, the cause of its destruction, for the opportunity 

 of prosecuting rhe seal fishery in a region where it could be carried on 

 with comparatively little danger and throughout the entire year was 

 too good to be neglected. 



Map 1. — Distribution of the West Indian Seal. (The irregular lines 

 show the form i r range of the animal. The figures refer 10 (he year 

 in which seals are known to have been taken at the localities in- 

 * dicated.) 



In 1675 Dampier notices a seal-fishery in operation at the Alacrane 

 Islands, north of Yucatan, saying that : " Here are many seals ; they 

 come up to sun themselves only on two or three of the Islands * * * 

 the Spaniards do often come hither to make Oyl of their Fat; upon 

 which account it has been visited by English-men from Jamaica, par- 

 ticularly by Capt. Long: who, having the command of a small bark, 

 came hither purposely to make Seal-Oyl, and anchored on the North side 

 of one of the sandy Islands, the most convenient Place, for his design." 

 Later on Captain Long discovered that although his anchorage might 

 be conveniently located, it nevertheless possessed certain undesirable 

 drawbacks, for one of the fierce " northers" that sweep across the Gulf 

 of Mexico, came up and blew his bark ashore. He was, however, for- 

 tunate enough to get the vessel oil, and having repaired her "went 

 merrily away for Trist " with a full cargo of "Oyl." Sir Hans Sloaue, 

 founder of the British Museum, who visited the Bahamas in 1687-'88, 

 wrote that these "Islands are tilled with seals; sometimes fishers will 

 catch one hundred in a night. They try. or melt Them, and bring off 

 their oil for lamps to the islands."' By 1813 the seal seems to have 



