OVERDRIVING AND REDRIVING. 247 



ing to the weather. At Zapadnie rookery, on St. George, the drive to 

 the killing grounds is less than a mile. The seals are now being killed 

 there instead of being driven across the island, as they were prior to 

 1878, when it took three days to make the journey. There is now a salt 

 house at Zapadnie, at which the skins are salted as soon as taken. 



The killing grounds on both islands are all situated within a very. 

 short distance from the shore, and seals not suit- 

 able to be killed, or that are turned out for any Danl. Webster, p. 182. 

 cause, immediately go into the water, and after 



sporting around for an hour or two, they return to the hauling grounds, 

 and to all appearances they are as unconcerned and careless of the pres- 

 ence of man as they were before they were driven to the killing grounds. 



OVERDRIVING AND REDRIVING. 



Page 158 of The Case. 



The same seal is sometimes driven several times during the season. 

 One with a peculiar spot on him was driven in 

 more than a dozen times in one season. His skin j n o. Armstrong, p. l. 

 was in such condition that we did not want it. 



But I do not think that he or any other one of the drove was injured by 

 the exertion. The driving gave them, with rare exceptions, very little 

 more exercise than they appeared to take when left to themselves. The 

 practice of driving has always been conducted the same as when I was 

 on the islands, and the seals have thriven and increased under it. 

 They grow much tamer, too, with repeated driving, and seem to learn 

 the road and what is expected of them on the killing ground. It is 

 much less trouble to handle a drove of seals from the rookery very near 

 the village than those from a distant point. 



Redriving of the growing males from the various hauling grounds 

 was made at intervals of several days, and did 

 not cause them any injury, and I am thoroughly ciias. Bryant, p. 8. 

 satisfied that there was not a single instance in 



which the virility of a male seal was destroyed or impaired by redriv- 

 ing. 



I never saw or heard of a case where a male seal was seriously injured 

 by driving or redriving. Certainly the repro- 

 ductive powers were never in the slightest degree Samuel Falconer, p. 162. 

 impaired by these means. When we consider that 



the bulls, while battling on the rookeries to maintain their positions, 

 cut great gashes in the flesh of their necks and bodies, are covered 

 with gaping wounds, lose great quantities of blood, fast on the islands 

 for three or four months, and then leave the islands lean and covered 

 with scars, to return the following season fat, healthy, and full of vigor, 

 to go through again the same mutilation, and repeating this year after 

 year, the idea that driving or redriving, which can not possibly be as 

 severe as their exertions during a combat, can affect such unequal 

 vigor and virility, is utterly preposterous and ridiculous. To show the 

 wonderful vitality of the male seal, I will give one instance which came 

 under my own observation : A drive of about 3,000 bachelors had been 

 made, and, after going a short distance, was left in charge of a boy; by 

 his negligence they escaped from his control, and the whole number 



