HABITS. 265 



tionaWy does, with reference to our continent ; for it lias been 

 and. is often shot upon the Aleutian Islands and many rocky 

 islets of the northwest coast. 



" The sea-lion in no respect whatever manifests the intelligence 

 and sagacity exhibited by the fur-seal* and must be rated far 

 below, although next, in natural order. I have no hesitation 

 in putting this Eumetopias of the Prybilov Islands, apart from 

 the sea-lion common at San Francisco and Santa Barbara, as a 

 distinct animal ; and I call attention to the excellent descrip- 

 tion of the California sea-lion, made public in the April num- 

 ber for 1872 of the Overland Monthly, by Capt. C. M. Scammon, 

 in which the distinguishing characters, externally, of this animal 

 are weU defined, and by which the difference between the 

 Eumetopias of Bering Sea and that of the coast of California 

 can at once be seen ; and also I notice one more point in which 

 the dissimilarity is marked the northern sea-lion never barks 

 or howls like the animal at the Farralones [sic] or Santa Bar- 

 bara. Young and old, both sexes, from one year and upward, 

 have only a deep hass growl, and prolonged, steady roar ; while 

 at San Francisco sea-lions break out incessantly with a ' honk- 

 ing' bark or howl, and never roar. 



" I am not to be understood as saying that all the sea-lions met 

 with on the Calif ornian coast are different from E. stelleri of 

 Bering Sea. I am well satisfied that stragglers from the north 

 are down on the Farralones, but they are not migrating back 

 and forth every season ; and I am furthermore certain that not 

 a single animal of the species most common at San Francisco 

 was present among those breeding on the Prybilov Islands in 

 1872-'73. 



"According to the natives of Saint George, some fifty or sixty 

 years ago the Eumetopias held almost exclusive possession of 

 the island, being there in great numbers, some two or three 

 hundred thousand 5 and that, as the fur-seals were barely per- 

 mitted to land by these animals, and in no great number, the 

 Eussians directed them (the natives) to hunt and worry the 

 sea-lions off from the island, and the result was that as the sea- 

 lions left, the fur-seals came, so that to-day they occupy nearly 

 the same ground covered by the Eumetopias alone sixty years 

 ago. This statement is, or seems to be, corroborated by Choris, 

 in his description of the lies S. -George's et S.-Paul's [sic], visited 

 by him fifty years ago; * but the account given by Bishop Ven- 



"* Voyage Pittoresqiie autoiir du Monde." 



