AFTER THE SEAL 



animal that, when dead, serves him in so many capacities 

 Often he harpoons it as he does the narwhal, in ice-holes ; 

 with this difference, that he, and not the hunted animal, 

 makes the hole. In winter time many thousands of seals 

 get "iced up," just as the dolphins do; but they must 

 come up to breathe from time to time, although they 

 close their nostrils when they plunge, and though there 

 is a very long interval between any two respirations. 

 Therefore the holes which the fishermen* make in the ice 

 are just so many seal-traps, and all that the men have 

 to do is to stand round the hole and spear each luckless 

 creature as it comes to the surface of the water, drag out 

 the carcass, and take it home. 



When the frost begins to break up, the seals struggle 

 out of the water and begin to jump about on the ice or 

 the rocks. Then the Eskimos vary their methods of 

 hunting. A band of them, armed with clubs, spears, or 

 axes, watch the movements of a flock of seals and gradu- 

 ally manage to cut it off from all return to the sea ; then 

 spread themselves round it and gradually close in. A seal 

 looks such an innocent, gentle beast when you see it 

 amusing itself at the Zoological Gardens or Brighton 

 Aquarium ; its merry, yet pathetic, eyes look as though 

 they belonged to an animal that could offer no resistance to 

 any persecutor, human or other ; but sealers tell a different 

 tale. True, it will not actually pursue a man beyond the 

 limits of what it regards as its own ground ; but in order 

 to escape to the water when death is otherwise imminent, 

 it will make as good a fight of it as any other animal. 

 A bulldog is a small thing, but we do not care to be 



300 



