338 THE BIRD WATCHER 
more modified in sfation to an aquatic life, would 
here have considerably the advantage of them. But 
the reverse is the case, at least if one can at all judge 
from a comparison of the swimming powers of the 
two kinds as exhibited in captivity. Never have I 
seen anything more wonderful than the way in which 
these ofariide tore through the water, when pieces of 
fish were thrown to them, in that wretched concrete 
basin which disgraces both our humanity and common 
sense at that beast-Bastille of our Gardens. The 
speed seemed really—I do not say it did—to approach 
to that of a galloping horse, and, in comparison to 
it, that of the seal, which could get nothing, and 
had to be fed afterwards, might almost be called 
slow. Yet whilst the latter swam with the motions 
of a fish, and looked like one, the other had more 
the appearance of a quadruped gone mad in the 
water. The great fore-flippers were largely used— 
indeed, they seemed to do the principal part of the 
work—whilst the much smaller ones of the common 
seal were pressed, as here, against the sides, and 
progress was almost wholly due to the fish-like 
motions of the posterior part of the body, and the 
hind feet or paddles, making, together, the tail. This 
was many years ago, when the common seals at the 
Gardens used to occupy the larger, or, to speak more 
properly, the less minute of the two concrete basins 
provided for oceanic animals. It was not tillafter the 
arrival of their more showy relatives that these poor 
creatures—the homely dwellers about our own coasts 
