THE FUR-SEAL ISLANDS OF ALASKA. 



51 



a famous Rendezvous for the "liolluscbickie", and from them, during the season, the natives make regular drives, 

 having only to step out from their houses in the morning and walk but a few rods to find their fur-bearing quarry. 



Passing over the sands on our way down 

 to the point, we quickly come to a basaltic 

 ridge or back-bone, over which the sand has 

 been rifted by the winds, and which supports 

 a rank and luxuriant growth of the Eh/mus 

 and other grasses, with beautiful flowers. A 

 few hundred feet farther along our course 

 brings us in full view, as we look to the south, 

 of one of the most entrancing spectacles which 

 seals afford to man. We look down upon and 

 along a grand promenade-ground, which slopes 

 gently to the eastward, and trends south- 

 ward down to the water from the abrupt walls 

 bordering ou the sea on the west, over a 

 parade-plateau as smooth as the floor of a ball- 

 room, 2,000 feet in length, from 500 to 1,000 

 feet in width, over which multitudes of "hol- 

 luschickie" are filing in long strings, or de- 

 ploying in vast platoons, hundreds abreast, in 

 an unceasing march and countermarch; the 

 breath which rises into the cold air from a 

 hundred thousand hot throats hangs like 

 clouds of white steam in tin 1 gray fog itself; 

 indeed, it may be said to be a seal-fog peculiar 

 to the spot, while the din, the roar arising 

 over all, defies our description. 



We notice to our right and to our left, the 

 immense solid masses of the breeding-seals at 

 Gorbotch, and those stretching and trending 

 around nearly a mile from our feet, far around to the Reef point below and opposite the parade-ground, with here 

 and there a neutral passage left open for the "holluschickie" to go down and come up from the waves. 



The adaptation of this ground of the Reef rookery to the requirements of the seal is perfect. It so lies that it 

 falls gently from its high Zoltoi bay-margin on the west to the sea ou the east; and upon its broad expanse not a 

 solitary puddle of mud spotting is to be seen, though everything is reeking with moisture, and the fog even dissolves 

 into rain as we view the scene. Every trace of vegetation upon this parade has been obliterated; a few tufts of 

 giass, capping the summits of those rocky hillocks, indicated on the eastern and middle slope, are the only signs of 

 botanical life which the seals have suffered to remain. 



A small rock, "Seev -t ...e Kammin," five or six hundred feet right to the southward and out at sea, is also 

 covered with the black and yellow forms of fur-seals and sea lions. It is environed by shoal-reefs, rough, and kelp- 

 grown, which navigators prudently avoid. 



This rookery of the Reef proper has 4,016 feet of sea-margin, with an average depth of 150 feet, making ground 

 for 301,000 breeding-seals and their young. Gorbotch rookery has 3,0(i() feet of sea-margin, with an average depth 

 of 100 feet, making ground lor 183,000 breeding-seals and their young; an aggregate for this great Eeef rookery of 

 484,000 breeding-seals and their young. Heavy as this enumeration is, yet the aggregate only makes the Eeef 

 rookery third in importance, compared with the others which we are yet to describe. 



Lagoon rookery.— We now pass from the Eeef up to the village, where one naturally would not expect to 

 find breeding-seals within less than a pistol-shot from the natives' houses; but it is a fact, nevertheless, for on 

 looking at the sketch map of the Lagoon rookery herewith presented, it will be noticed that I have located a little 

 gathering of breeding-seals right under the village hill to ihe westward of that place called "Xah Speel". This is 

 in itself an insignificant rookery and never has been a large one, though it is one of the oldest ou the island. It 

 is only interesting, however, superficially so, on account of its position, and the tact that through every day of the 

 season half the population of the entire village go and come to the summit of the bluff, which overhangs it, where 

 they peer down for hours at a time upon the methods and evolutions of the "kautickie" below, the seals themselves 

 looking up with intelligent appreciation of the fact that, though they are in the hands of man, yet he is wise enough 

 not to disturb them there as they rest. 



If at Nah Speel, or that point rounding into the village cove, there were any suitable ground for a rookery to 

 grow upon or spread over, the seals would doubtless have been there long ago. There are, however, no such 

 natural advantages offered them ; what there is they have availed themselves of. 



