THE SEAL 119 
Female Dugong of Ceylon. Gren Sir J. Emerson Tennent’s Work on Ceylon.) 
ing fish-like from the shoulders to the tail, their abundance of 
fat, the lightness of which is so favourable to swimming, the 
position of their feet, admirably 
formed for rowing, paddling, and 
steering, their whole economy, in a 
word, is calculated for the sea. Al- 
though citizens of two worlds, their 
real element is evidently the water, 
from which their food is exclusively Sicicomo oo 
derived. 
Seals are found in almost all seas, but they particularly abound 
on the coasts of the colder regions of the earth, and diminish in 
size and numbers as they 
approach the torrid zone. 
Small seals are found near 
Surinam, but the giants of 
the family, the huge sea- 
elephant, the sea-lion, the 
sea-bear, belong exclusively 
to those higher latitudes 
which the sun visits ‘only 
with slanting rays, or where peacriee 
the winter forms a dreary and continuous night. 
How wonderful to see the desolate coasts of the icy seas 
peopled by such herds of great warm-blooded mammalia! But 
there, where the dry land produces only the scantiest vegetation, 
