THE SEA ELEPHANT. 121 
hence it is usually "minced" (the "horse-pieces" cut into thin slices) and put 
into tight casks to prevent any waste of the oil ; then, when a smooth day comes, 
they are rolled down the beach, and pulled through the rollers by the boats ; or 
the tender is anchored near shore, a line is run to the vessel, and the casks hauled 
alongside, hoisted in, and transferred to the ship, where the oil is tried out and 
"stowed down" in the usual manner. 
As soon as the season is over — or, rather, when the time has come for the 
ship to leave, either for home, or to find shelter in some harbor at the Island of 
Desolation — the shore -party is supplied with provisions, all the surplus articles 
that were landed are re -embarked, the heavy anchors are at last weighed, and 
amid hail, snow, and sleet, the ship under her half- frozen canvas bounds over the 
billows, and soon disappears in the offing. 
The vessels having departed, the officers and men left on the island resume 
their daily occupations. Usually the number is divided into two "gangs," stationed 
at separate places, where clusters of huts have sprung up for the use of those 
belonging to the different vessels, who have from time to time made it a tempo- 
rary abiding -place. Try -works are built, and a shanty is erected for a cooper's 
shop. These two habitable spots are known as "Whisky Bay" and "The Point;" 
the former being a slight indentation of the shore -line, where the Elephants in 
countless numbers were found by the first vessel visiting there, which, as report 
says, had a supply of "old rye" stowed in her run. The captain, in the heat 
of his successful prosecution of the arduous business of procuring a cargo, gave 
his men permission to "splice the main brace strong and often," so long as the 
work went briskly on; and it is humorously told that this noted landing-place was 
"christened" at the cost of barrels of the beverage, thus securing to it a name as 
lasting as that of the prominent headland on the borders of the Okhotsk Sea, well 
known to whalemen as "Whisky Bluff." From day to day the separated parties, 
living some thirty miles apart, hunt the animals for leagues along the shores, with 
the varied success incident to season or circumstances ; and, although on the same 
island, the face of the country is so broken — being rent into deep chasms, walled 
in as it were by giddy, shelving heights, making it impossible to travel, even on 
foot, far inland toward its extremities, and the shores hedged in by sharp ridges 
of basalt, stretching out into the sea — the two divisions know nothing of each 
other until the vessels return, which is frequently after an absence of from eight 
to twelve months, and during that time a thousand or more barrels of oil may have 
been collected. 
Notwithstanding the hardships and deprivations that are undergone to make a 
M aiiind Mammals. — 16. 
