THE FUR-SEAL ISLANDS OF ALASKA. 



73 



150 seals at a. time, make what they call a "pod", which they surround in a circle, huddling the seals one on another 

 as they narrow it down, until they are directly within reach and under their clubs. Then the chief, after he has 

 cast his experienced eye over the straggling, writhing "kautickie" in the center, passes the word that such and 

 such a seal is bitten, that such and such a seal is too young, that such and such a seal is too old; the attention 

 of his men being called to these points, he gives the word "strike", and instantly the heavy clubs come down all 

 around, aud every one that is eligible is stretched out stunned and motionless, in less time, really, than I take to 

 tell it. Those seals spared by order of the chief, now struggle from under and over the bodies of their insensible 

 companions and pass, hustled off by the natives, back to the sea.* 



Method of Aleuts in skinninci fur-seals. — The clubs are dropped, the men seize the prostrate seals by 

 the hind-flippers, and drag them out, 

 so they are spread on the ground with- 

 out touching each other; then every 

 sealer takes his knife and drives it 

 into the heart at a point between the 

 fore-flippers of each stunned form ; the 

 blood gushes forth, and the quivering 

 of the animal presently ceases. A 

 single stroke of a heavy oak blud- 

 geon, well and fairly delivered, will 

 crush in at once the slight, thin bones 

 of a fur-seal's skull, and lay the crea- 

 ture out almost lifeless. These blows 

 are, however, usually repeated two or 

 three times with each animal, but they 

 are very quickly done. The bleeding, 

 which is immediately effected, is so 

 speedily undertaken in order that the 

 strange reaction, which the sealers 

 call "heating", shall be delayed for 

 half an hour or so, or untd the seals 

 can all be drawn out, and laid in some 

 disposition for skinning. 



I have noticed that within less 

 than thirty minutes from the time a 

 perfectly sound seal was knocked 

 down, it had so "heated", owing to 

 the day being warmer and drier than 

 usual, that, when touching it with my 

 foot, great patches of hair and fur 

 scaled off. This is a rather excep- 

 tionally rapid metamorphosis — it will, 

 however, take place in every instance, 

 within an hour, or an hour and a half 

 on these warm days, after the first blow is struck, and the seal is quiet in death ; hence no time is lost by the prudent 

 chief in directing the removal of the skins as rapidly as the seals are knocked down and dragged out. If it is a cool 

 day, after bleeding the first "pod" which has been prostrated in the manner described, aud after carefully drawing 

 the slain from the heap in which they have fallen, so that the bodies will spread over the ground just free from 

 touching one another, they turn to aud strike down another " pod"; and so on, until a whole thousand or two are laid 

 out, or the drove, as corraled, is finished. The day, however, must be raw and cold for this wholesale method. Then, 

 after killing, they turn to work, and skin ; but, if it is a warm day, every pod is skinned as soon as it is knocked down. 



The labor of skinning is exceedingly severe; aud is tryiug even to au expert, demauding long practice ere the 

 muscles of the back and thighs are so developed as to permit a man to bend down to, and liuish well, a fair day's 



*The aim and force with which tin- native directs his blow, determines the death of the seal; if struck direct and violently, a single 

 stroke is enough; the seals' heads are stricken so hard sometimes that those crystaline lenses to their eyes fly out from the orbital 

 sockets like hail-stones, or little pebbles, and frequently struck me sharply in the face, or elsewhere, while I stood near by watching the 

 killing-gang at work. 



A singular lurid green light suddenly suffuses the eye of the fur-seal at intervals when it is very much excited, as the "podding" for 

 the clubbers is in progress ; and, at the moment when last raising its head it sees the uplifted bludgeons on every hand above, fear seems 

 then for the first time to possess it and to instantly gild its eye in this strange manner. When the seal is brained in this state of optical 

 coloration, I have noticed that the opalescent tinting remained well defined for many hours or a whole day alter death ; these remarkable 

 flashes are very characteristic to the eyes of the old males during their hurly-burly on the rookeries, but never appear in the younger 

 classes unless as just described, as far as I could observe. 



The flensed carcaa of a fur-seal. 



