THE PACIFIC WALRUS. 



" I write ' the walrus of Behring Sea ' because this animal 

 is quite distinct from the walrus of the North Atlantic and 

 Greenland, differing from it specifically in the most striking 

 manner." 



Mr. H. W. Elliott, on the Pacific Walrus, 1873. 



The sun shines steadily upon the burnished 

 surface of the Polar Ocean. Above, a sky of 

 brilliant blue ; seawards, a gently heaving surface, 

 calm as a mill-pond ; landwards, a rugged shore, 

 backed by snow-clad hills, which reflect in creamy 

 brightness the welcome rays of the sun. Prone in 

 an icy channel lies the carcase of a rorqual, beclouded 

 with seagulls ; some twenty polar bears and a crowd 

 of white foxes are tearing and dragging at this 

 welcome find. A small group of sea-lions bask in 

 the sunshine, and away on the hillside a few specks 

 indicate a troop of caribou deer. The animals are 

 too far off to make any audible sound ; the world is 

 "dumb with snow;" around and over everything, 

 like an invisible pall, hangs the silence of the Arctic. 



A sound, like the deepest of sighs, rises from the 

 surface of the sea ; a huge black object has appeared 

 in the opal water. A faint vapour ascends from 

 unseen blow-holes ; and with a whisk of his broad- 

 fluked tail, the whale descends into the abyss. 

 Again silence. A few petrels flit over the heaving 

 waters. Now a tiny breath of vapour appears just 



