ALASKA. 131 



running in among tlie seals, and had to be driven away to a 

 good feeding-ground by a small boy detailed for the puri)ose. 



The sound arising from these great breeding-grounds of the 

 fur-seal, where thousands upon thousands of angry, vigilant 

 bulls are roaring, chuekling, piping, and nudtitudes of seal- 

 mothers are calling in hollow, bla ating tones to their young, 

 which in turn respond incessantly, is simply indescribable. It 

 is, at a sbght distance, softened into a deep booming, as of a 

 cataract, and can be heard a long distance off at sea, under 

 favorable circumstances as far as five or six miles, and fre- 

 quently warns vessels that may be approaching the islands in 

 thick, foggy weather, of the positive, though unseen, proximity 

 of laud. iSlght and day, throughout the seasou, the din of the 

 rookeries is cteady and constant. 



The seals seem to sufi'er great inconvenience from a compar- 

 atively low degree of heat; for, with a temperature of 40° and 

 48° on land, during the summer, they show signs of distress from 

 heat whenever they make any exertion, i^ant, raise their hind 

 flippers, and use them incessantly as fans. With the thermom- 

 eter at 5i>°-C0o, they seem to suffer even when at rest, and at 

 sucli times the eye is struck by the kaleidoscopic appearance 

 of a rookery, on which a million seals are spread out in every 

 imaginable position their bodies can assume, all industriously 

 fanning themselves, using sometimes the fore flippers as ven- 

 tilators, as it were, by holding them aloft motionless, at the 

 same moment fanning briskly with the hind flipper, or flippers, 

 according as they sit or lie. This wavy motion of flapping and 

 fanning gives a peculiar shade of, hazy indistinctness to the 

 whole scene, which is difficult to express in language; but one 

 of the most prominent characteristics of the fur-seal is this fan- 

 ning manner in which thej" use their flippers, when seen on the 

 breeding-grounds in season. They also, when idling, as it 

 were, offshore at sea, lie on their sides, with only a partial ex- 

 posure of the body, the head submerged, and hoist up a fore or 

 hind flipper clear of the water, while scratching themselves or 

 enjoying a nap; but in this position there is no fanning. I say 

 "scratching," because the seal, in common with all animals, is 

 preyed upon by vermin, a species of louse and a tick, peculiar 

 to itself. 



All the bulls, from the very first, that have been able to hold 

 their positions, have not left them for an instant, night or day, 

 nor do they do so until the end of the rutting-season, which 



