THE FUR-SEAL ISLANDS OF ALASKA. 105 



on this the spot of its birth, to repair for food iu the sea; she is absent by these excursions, on account of the fish 

 not coming inshore within a radius of (at the least) one hundred miles of the breeding-grounds, through intervals 

 varying', as I have said, from a single day to three or four, as the ease may be. The manner in which she returns 

 after feeding, and in which she singles out by scent, and at a glance, her own offspring from many thousands 

 surrounding it, I have clearly described in a foregoing chapter.* 



Preliminary advances of the sexual union. — The pup being born, the cow rapidly passes into "heat". 

 I have noticed examples where ten hours ouly elapsed between the event of the birth and that of copulation, and 

 I doubt not of full impregnation for another period. But as a rule forty-eight hours will be the fair figure to express 

 the time from the birth to the appearance and desire known as "being in heat". The cow always makes the first 

 advances to the bull. If she is one of the earlier subjects for his attention, it is no sooner said on her part than 

 done on his; but should she be of the later applicants in his harem, after he has been more or less wearied and 

 exhausted by the vital drafts made upon him, she must wait. I have observed instances of this character in which 

 the female teases the male for hours and hours before arousing his desire. Indeed, I had brought strongly to mind 

 that same coquetting so comically rendered in the barn-yard of almost every farmer, where the turkey-hen solicits 

 the turkey-cock. When thus teasing the male, the female croons up by his shoulders, playfully biting and pulling 

 at his neck and mouth, stretching herself flat and quivering posteriorly before him, until the hot blood of desire is 

 excited in the wearied and languid male, and then he closes the pantomime. 



Pelaoic coition impossible. — In this act of coition on these breeding-grounds of St. Paul and St. George, 

 1 have noticed the fact, that whenever the female was well covered by the male on the flat or smooth shelves of rock 

 or earth, then they moved and shuffled about without any particular effective coition until brought up against a 

 rougher inequality, or some fragments of lava shingle, so characteristic of the rookery grounds. The reason for 

 this is due to the fact, that in spite of the great weight of the male, six times more than that of the female which 

 it covers, the orgasms are so rapid and violent that, unless the female is held by some other agency than the weight 

 of the male, she is literally shoved ahead and away from under him. This fact I call attention to, as it alone is 

 sufficient, upon the slightest reflection, to satisfy any judicial mind that it is a physical impossibility for these seals 

 to copulate in the water. Under no conceivable position assumed for this supposed pelagic coition could effectual 

 sexual connection be made.t 



Action of reproduction. — The male serving the female covers her exactly as a big Newfoundland dog would 

 mount a small terrier slut. The "seecatchie" draws his heavy body over and upon the outstretched spine of the 

 female, which lies prone before him on her stomach ; so that when the male has adjusted himself, which he does by 

 arching his back from the shoulders to the os coccyx, he covers her so completely that nothing of her form can bo 

 seen, except a portion of her head just peering out from between his fore-flippers and under his broad chest. The tips 

 of her hind-flippers are now and then visible, as he humps his back with each succeeding orgasm. Notwithstanding 

 their great rapidity and the muscular power employed, these orgasms last, without interruption, for the surprising 

 space of from eight to fourteen minutes — not a second's intermission. Of course, toward the close of the season, 

 when the male is tired, he does not remain in coitu longer than three or four minutes. On account of the vigor and 

 duration of this first coitus, I am inclined to think that that female has no further intercourse with that male, or any 

 other one, during the rest of the season. She is satisfied, and passes rapidly out of heat. Certain it is that she is 



"When the females first come ashore there is no sign of affection manifested, whatever, between the sexes. The males are surly 

 and morose, and the females entirely indifferent to such reception. They are, however, subjected to very harsh treatment sometimes in 

 the progress of battles between the males for their possession, and a few of them are badly bitten and lacerated every season. 



One of the cows that arrived at Nah Speel, St. Paul island, early in June, 1872, was treated to a cruel mutilation in this manner, under 

 my eyes. When she had finally lauded on the baroun rocks of one of the numerous ''seecatchie" at the water front of this small rookery, 

 and while I was carefully making a sketch of her graceful outlines, a rival bull, adjacent, reached out from his station and seized her with 

 his mouth at the nape of the neck, just as a cat lifts a kitten. At the same instant, almost simultaneously, the old male that was rightfully 

 entitled to her charms, turned, and caught her iu his teeth, by the skiu of her posterior dorsal region. There she was, lifted aud 

 suspended in mid-air, between the jaws of her furious rivals, until, in obedience, to their powerful struggles, the hide of her back gave 

 way, and, as a ragged flap of the raw skin more than sis inches broad and a foot in length was torn up and tiom her spine, she passi d. 

 witli a rush, into the possession of the bull which had covetously seized her. She uttered no cry during this barbarous treatment, nor did 

 she, when settled again, turn to her torn aud bleeding wound to notice it in any way whatsoever that I could observe. 



When severe inflammation takes place, they seek the water, disappearing promptly from your scrutiny. 



tThose extremely heavy adult males which arrive first in the season, and take their stations on the rookeries, are so fat that they 

 do not exhibit a wrinkle or a fold of the hide enveloping their blubber-lined bodies; most of this fattx deposit is found around the 

 shoulders and the neck, though a warm coat of blubber covers all the other portions of the body save the flippers ; this blubber thickening 

 of the neck and chest is characteristic oi' the adult males only, which are, by its provisions, enabled to sustain the extraordinary 

 protracted fasting periods incident to their habit of life aud reproduction. 



When those superlatively fleshy bulls first arrive, a curious body tremor seems to attend every movement that the animals make 

 on land; their fat appears to ripple backward and forward under their skins, like waves: as tiny alternate with their flippers in 

 walking, the whole form of the ''seecatchie'' shakes as a bowl full of jelly does when agitated on the table before us. 



There is also a perfect uniformity iu the coloration of the breeding coats id' the fur-seals; and it is strikingly manifest while inspecting 

 the rookeries late in .Inly, when they are solidly massed thereon. At a quarter mill- distance, the whole immense aggregate of animal 

 lib' seems to be 1 fused into a huge homogeneous body that is alternately roused up in sections and then composed, just as a quantity of 

 iron filings, covering the bottom of a saucer, will rise and tall, when a magnet is passed ov< i and around t lie dish. 



