Notes on Antarctic Seals. 75 



coat (Fig. 3). So much does the coat of this Seal vary in colour 

 and marking with age, sex, and season, that much confusion has 

 arisen in the description of its skin. There is now in the Museum 

 a fairly complete series of skins, preserved by Mr. Hanson, showing 

 how this Seal changes from a creamy-white, faintly mottled with a 

 pale rusty colour on the flanks, shoulders, and sides of the head, to 

 the very beautiful and characteristically silky coat of warm 

 brownish grey, darker mid-dorsally, silvery white ventrally, mottled 

 as before, but now with a very rich warm brown, instead of the 

 hardly perceptible rusty colour. 



That these are merely seasonal changes is evident from the 

 fact that in the creamy- white skins can nearly always be found 

 a mid-dorsal line of the new and darker hair appearing ; whereas in 

 the more handsomely mottled dark skins, a few belated patches 

 of the old white fur can still be found attached to the sides of the 

 animal. The largest, and presumably the oldest, of the Seals, 

 probably males, still in their creamy white coat, show no trace of 

 mottling anywhere ; but on the flippers, both hind- and fore-, where 

 the moult first takes effect, there appears, without exception, the 

 rich and beautiful dark brown mottling of the new coat, with its 

 characteristic silky gloss. The flippers share in the change. From 

 being covered with a rusty or creamy-white hair to the end of each 

 digit, they moult to a very rich brown colour, in some cases very 

 dark, marbled with silky pale-grey spots. 



Mr. Bernacchi observes : — " One of the first Seals to be met with 

 on entering the pack-ice is the Crab-eating or White Seal {Lobodon 

 carcinophagics), which is a Seal common during the summer months in 

 the pack-ice, and even seen far south towards the Great Ice Barrier, 

 but rarely met with near the shores of the Antarctic lands. In appear- 

 ance this Seal varies somewhat ; or, more correctly speaking, its colour 

 varies according to the seasons of the year, and also according to the age 

 and sex of the animal. The long old winter coat is creamy- white, 

 hiding almost completely the mottlings on the shoulders and flanks 

 and sides of the head. During the early part of January the Seal 

 commences to moult, discards its old coat, and by the end of the 

 month emerges with a beautiful silky-grey brown skin, with richly- 

 marked mottlings. The body of this Seal is not rounded like the 

 Weddell seal, but is rather slim and slightly flattened out when lying 

 on the ice. It is somewhat solitary, pugnacious when disturbed, 

 and feeds principally on Utiphausia." 



" The only young of this Seal procured by the ' Southern Cross ' 

 Expedition was the specimen killed near its mother in Eobertson 



