1 28 MAMMALS. 



it occurs also in the American Bison, in the Lemming and some Eats. How far the phenomena 

 are at all of the same nature in mammals as in birds we do not know ; that of the Seal 

 seems likest to the migration of birds, but its migrations, like that of the others, may be a mere 

 matter of conrmissiariat. 



Walrus (Map 28 * ). — The Walrus is an animal essentially peculiar to the regions of the North 

 Pole. It has never been seen alive further south than 60° N.L. ; and 80^° N.L. is believed to be their 

 highest latitude. Hamburg is the most southerly point on any part of the coast of the Atlantic where 

 fossil remains of it have yet been foimd. Near that city these have been found in superficial deposits. 

 It must have reached further south on the other side of the Atlantic, for remains have been obtained 

 in New Jersey, Virginia, and Massachusetts. It has been said to have occurred in beds anterior to 

 the present epoch, and Baron Cuvier has given to that last assertion the authority of his name 

 in his great work : " After a fresh examination of the bones found at Angers, I have myself re- 

 cognised a rib and a vertebra of a Walrus," &c.* But Gervaisf has pointed out tliat there is 

 reason to doubt this, as the only portion of these remains which is stili accessible has been found 

 to belong, not to the Walrus, but to the Halitherium (an extinct form of Sirenian). 



It is one of the animals which, like the Rhytina and the Dodo, seem doomed to extinction at the 

 hands of man ; and, according to all appearance, the execution of the doom will not be long delayed. 

 In former times its numbers in the localities which it frequented seem to have been very great. 

 We learn from the voyage of Ohthere, which was performed about a thousand years ago, that 

 the Walrus then abounded on the coast of Finmarken itself; it has, however, abandoned that 

 coast for some centuries, although indi\'idual stragglers have been occasionally captured there up 

 to within the last thirty years. After thej' left the Finmarken coast. Bear Island J became the 

 principal scene of their destruction, but it in its turn was deserted, and none have been found there 

 for upwards of thirty years ; and now the Thousand Islands (south-east of Spitzbergen), Hope 

 Island (a little further north, but still in the south-east corner), and Ej'k Yse Island (still further 

 north, but not half way to the northern extremity of the Islands), in their turn, after being fre- 

 quented for years, have become very inferior hunting ground to the banks and skerries lying 

 to the north of Spitzbergen. 



Witsen mentions that in the year 1690 " Steuerman Iwanow (Steersman or Pilot, — I suppose 

 equivalent to Captain Ivanoff) suffered shipwreck on the Schaparow Bank, in 71° N.L., near the 

 coast of the peninsula which is bordered on the west by the Gulf of Obi, and was compelled to 

 remain with his crew a year on the bank. They killed so manj^ Walruses that their bodies formed 

 a pile of 630 English feet in length, and as much broad, and six feet high ; and they got 160 pounds 

 weight of teeth from them."§ 



mer of 1854. We have thus a demonstration that these J Bear, or Chcrie, or Cherry Island, is a diamond- 

 huge Seals return, in some instances at least, year after shaped island, about ten miles long, composed of secondary 

 year to the same localities. They leave the Farallones in rocks, principally sandstone and limestone, lying about 280 

 November and return in May, being absent about six miles north of the North Cape. Its names arc said to 

 months. How far they migrate during that interval, we be due to some of the early Dutch navigators, on their 

 have, at present, no means of determining. Newberry's way to China, once having seen a bear here, and to an 

 "Report United States Pacific Railroad Exploration," vol. English expedition sent out by Alderman Cherie, of Lon- 

 vi. ; Zoology, p. 51. 1857. don, afterwards erroneously fancying that they were the 



* CuviER, "Os.sem. Fo.ss." discoverers of the island, naming it after their patron. 



t Oervais, "Zool. and PalMont. Fi-anvais," 1859. § Witsen, "Noord en Oost Tartarye," pp. 913, 915. 



