ALASKA. 157 



iug-grouucis, the natives shoot down the bulls and then sur- 

 round and huddle u[> the cows, spearing them just behind the 

 lore-flippers. The killing of the sea-lions is quite an exciting 

 spectacle, a strange and unparalleled exhibition of its kind ; 

 and I cannot do better than to refer directly and silentlj' to my 



■ 



illustrations of it. The bodies are at once stripped of their 

 hides and much of the flesh, sinews, intestines, (with which the 

 native water-proof coats, &c., are made,) in conjunction with 

 the throat-linings, {cesoph a {/us,) and the skin of the flippers, which 

 is exceedingly tough and elastic, and used for soles to their 

 boots or " tarhosars.'- 



As the sea-lion is without fur, the skin has little or no com- 

 mercial value ; the hair is short, and longest over the nape of 

 the neck, straight, and somewhat coarse, varying in color greatly 

 as the seasons come and go. For instance, when the Uumetopias 

 makes his first appearance in the spring, and dries out upon 

 the land, he has a light-brownish, rufous tint, darker shades 

 back and under the fore flippers and on the abdomen ; by the 

 expiration of a mouth or six week, 15th June, he will be a bright 

 golden-rufous or ocher, and this is just before shedding, which 

 sets in by the middle of August, or a little earlier. After the 

 new coat has fairly grown, and just before he leaves the island 

 for the season, in November, it will be a light sepia, or vandyke- 

 brown, with deeper shades, almostdark upon the belly; the cows, 

 after shedding, do not color up so dark as the bulls, but when 

 they come back to the land next year they are identically the 

 same in color, so that the eye in glancing over a sea-lion 

 rookery in June and July cannot discern any noted dissimilar- 

 ity of coloring between the bulls and the cows f and also the 

 young males and yearlings appear in the same golden-browu 

 and ocher, with here and there an animal spotted somewhat 

 like a leopard, the yellow, rufous ground predominating, with 

 patches of dark-brown irregularly interspersed. I have never 

 seen any of the old bulls or cows thus mottled, and think very 

 likely it is due to some irregularity in the younger animals 

 during the season of shedding, for I have not noticed it early 

 in the season, and failed to observe it at the close. Many of 

 the old bulls have a grizzled or slightly brindled look during 

 the shedding-period, or, that is, from the 10th August up to the 

 10th or 20th of November; the pups, when born, are of a rich, 

 dark chestnut-brown ; this coat they shed in October, and 

 take one much lighter, but still darker than their parents', 



but not a great deal. 



