THE COMMON SEAL AND THE GREENLAND SEAL 



729 



miles, more especially if the ear be applied to the ice. As ari indication of the 

 enormous numbers in which these seals once existed, it may be mentioned that 

 during the year 1866 a single steamer obtained 22,000 seals in nine days; and it was 

 not uncommon for a ship's crew to kill from 500 to 800 adults and 2,000 young 

 ones in a day. In Greenland the annual catch was estimated at 33,000, while that 

 in Newfoundland used to exceed 500,000, and in the Jan-Mayen seas the total num- 

 ber killed each year was fully 30,000. 



Of the remaining members of the genus Phoca our notice must be 



very brief. It has been already mentioned how the ringed seal (/*. 



kispida) may be distinguished at all ages from the two preceding species, and refer- 



SEALS SWIMMING. 



ence has likewise been made to its adult coloration. It may be added that the 

 ringed seal differs from the common seal by its more slender form, longer limbs and 

 tail, narrower head, and more pointed nose. The ringed seal is an inhabitant of the 

 Arctic and North Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, occasionally visiting the British 

 Islands; but it may be regarded as pre-eminently boreal, its true home being the icy 

 Arctic seas. Its favorite resorts are stated to be sheltered bays and fjords, in which 

 it remains so long as they are filled with solid ice; but when this breaks up the seals 

 betake themselves to ice floes, upon which the young are born in the months of 

 March and April. The ringed seal is not a migratory species, and in some localities 



