58 COMPARATIVE ANAToMY OF 



under the wave, (the usual period even for Whales ;) 

 and we are not prepared to state what the extreme 

 limit may be. Thus, Oantz states that when har- 

 pooned, they must come up in about a quarter 

 of an hour to take breath ;* arid Mr Edmonston in- 

 forms us that he once saw one of the Bearded 

 Seals entangled in a net, which struggled with 

 amazing force for more than twenty-five minutes, 

 without, once inspiring, and yet was brought to the 

 surface alive.f An observation of M= F. Cuvier's is 

 still more remarkable. He states, concerning those 

 which were preserved in the Menagerie at Paris> 

 that he has seen them, while asleep, keep their head 

 underwater consecutively, and consequently without 

 oreathing, for an hour at a time.f This is an ex- 

 traordinary phenomenon, even allowing that the 

 animal was in that somewhat lethargic condition, 

 to which we shall ere long allude. 



We now proceed to remark, that under water the 

 Seals are often subjected to an enormous pres- 

 sure, which must be resisted at the respective aper- 

 tures of the body, by an appropriate mechanism. 

 So is it, as we have already seen, in the nostrils, and 

 a similar provision is made for the eye ; and in 

 more ways, perhaps, than one. Thus Albinus 

 remarks, that at the inner angle of the eye there exists 

 a third eyelid, which may easily be drawn over the 

 whole eye ; an apparatus, he adds, frequently 

 supplied to those animals in which the eyelids are 



* See our account of the Greenland Seal. 



t View of Zetland, vol. ii. 295. 



% See our account of the Monk Seal. 



