THE SEA-LION 299 



succumbed to the lances of their assailants. The passage 

 to the shore soon got so blocked up with the dead and 

 dying that the unfortunate wretches behind could not 

 pass over, and were in a manner barricaded by a wall of 

 carcases. Considering that every thrust of a lance was 

 worth twenty dollars, the scene must have been one of 

 terrific excitement to the men. They slew, stabbed, 

 slaughtered, butchered, and murdered, until most of 

 their lances were rendered useless, and themselves were 

 drenched with blood and exhausted with fatigue. They 

 next went on board their vessels, ground their lances, 

 and had their dinners, and then they returned to their 

 sanguinary work ; nor did they cry " hold, enough ! " till 

 they had killed nine hundred walruses, and yet so fear- 

 less and so lethargic were the animals, that many 

 hundreds more remained sluggishly lying on other parts 

 of the island at no great distance. 



A walrus was brought to London in the reign of 

 James I. " When the King and many honourable 

 personages beheld it with admiration for the strange- 

 ness of the same."* Two specimens have of late reached 

 the London Zoological Gardens, but lived but a very 

 short time. That this species possesses docility and 

 intelligence similar to that of the seal, is shown by some 

 observations reported by Mr. Brown f with respect to a 

 young one he saw on board a ship in Davis' Straits in 

 1 86 1, and which had been caught off the coasts of 

 Greenland : 



" It was fed on oatmeal and water and pea soup, and 

 seemed to thrive. No fish could be got for it, and the 

 only animal food which it obtained was a little freshened 



* "Purchas, his pilgrimes," 1624, vol. iii. p. 560. 

 t In a very interesting communication made to the Zoological 

 Society cf London on June 25, 1868. 



