370 THE CARNIVORA 



hereditary enemy, the polar bear, on the land side, and stricken 

 down wholesale by man seawards, the day of its extermination 

 seems not far distant. The living Walrus, indeed, presents to us a 

 solitary example of a family once more numerous and widespread, 

 and doubtless coincident with a period when the climate was 

 different from that now existing where their fossil remains have 

 been discovered. In the deposits of Virginia in America, in our 

 Suffolk crag, and in contemporaneous beds in the neighbourhood 

 of Antwerp, bones of Walruses allied to the present northern 

 form have been dug up ; while the remains of genera of larger size 

 have also been discovered. The Walrus of the present day grows 

 to a considerable size, Elliott estimating the gross weight of an 

 ordinary full-grown male at 2,000 Ibs., while he mentions a specimen 

 shot in the Behring Sea as measuring nearly thirteen feet in length, 

 with a girth of fourteen feet. The unusually flattened head seems 

 disproportionately small to the great neck and sack-like body, 

 though the small, fierce, bloodshot eyes and formidable tusks give 

 it a ferocious appearance. 



On land the movements of these animals are very awkward. 

 With high-set shoulders and low hind-quarters, and squat limbs to 

 their heavy body, the forefeet are successively thrust flat forwards 

 from the wrist, each followed by a hitch and swing of the hind 

 foot, as from a pivot on the heel, ending in a sudden jerk. Thus 

 they straddle along in a clumsy way over the rough ice ; but in 

 the water their movements are wonderfully swift, easy, and graceful. 

 Though so forbidding of feature, the Walrus is in reality quiet 

 and inoffensive, unless attacked or roused in love-time, when 

 the male can be a very awkward customer to deal with at close 

 quarters. The tusks, which are such a characteristic feature, 

 vary from eight inches to two feet in length, and may weigh from 

 five to fifteen pounds. These teeth continuously grow, and as 

 they wear away their interior becomes filled with tooth bone. 

 They are not used only as weapons of defence, but for raising the 

 body out of the water on to the ice-floe and, more important still, 

 for procuring food. The Walrus frequents banks and shoals 

 where lie buried in the mud an abundance of molluscs, and these 

 are dug Up by the aid of the tusks and eagerly devoured. Other 

 marine invertebrates are also eaten, and the Walrus is said 

 to have a liking for dead whale. The females show the greatest 



