182 THE INHABITANTS OF THE SEA. 
bent double. The herd was so numerous, and their attacks sa 
incessant, that there was not time to load a musket, which indeed 
was the only effectual mode of seriously injuring them. The 
purser fortunately had his gun loaded, and the whole now being 
nearly exhausted with chopping and striking at their assailants, 
he snatched it up, and thrusting the muzzle down the throat of 
the leader, fired into his bowels. The wound proved mortal and 
the animal fell back amongst his companions, who immediately 
desisted from the attack, assembled round him, and in a moment 
quitted the boat, swimming away as hard as they could with 
their leader, whom they actually bore up with their tusks, and 
assiduously preserved from sinking. Whether this singular and 
compassionate conduct, which in all probability was done to 
prevent suffocation, arose from the sagacity of the animals, it is 
difficult to say; but there is every probability of it, and the fact 
must form an interesting trait in the history of the habits of the 
species. After the discharge of the purser’s gun, there remained 
of all the herd only one little assailant, which the seamen, out 
of compassion, were unwilling to molest. This young animal had 
been observed fighting by the side of the leader, and from the 
protection which was afforded it by its courageous patron, was 
imagined to be one of its young. This little animal had no 
tusks, but it swam violently against the boat, and struck her 
with its head, and indeed would have stove her, had it not been 
kept off by whale lances, some of which made deep incisions in 
its young sides. These, however, had not any immediate effect; 
the attack was continued, and the enraged little animal, though 
disfigured with wounds, even crawled upon the ice in pursuit of 
the seamen, who had relanded there, until one of them, out of 
compassion, put an end to its sufferings. 
The valuable ivory of its tusks, which is more solid, finer 
grained, and whiter than that of the elephant, exposes the 
walrus to the attacks of man, no less than his thick hide, from 
which a strong elastic leather is made, and his abundance of 
flesh and blubber. The former are sought by civilised nations, 
while the latter forms the chief food of the northern Esquimaux 
and of the Tschutchi on the western shore of Behring’s Straits. 
Every year a troop of Aleuts land on the northern coast 
of the peninsula of Aliaska, where the young walruses as- 
semble in great numbers during the summer, having most 
