476 EXTINCT AND VANISHING MAMMALS 



apparent, and in 1931 the Canadian Government passed an 

 order in council prohibiting the killing of walruses in the area 

 including Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, and northward, except 

 for food and not in excess of actual needs; and no one but an 

 Eskimo may kill walrus without a license. The export of 

 walrus tusks or ivory, except in the form of manufactured 

 articles, is also prohibited except by permit from the Minister 

 of Fisheries. 



Summing up the situation in Greenland, Jensen (1928) 

 writes that the walrus on the west coast "is only a permanent 

 resident between Sukkertoppen and Egedesminde particu- 

 larly at the mouth of North Str0mfiord, where in the autumn it 

 is in the habit of appearing in great numbers and creeps up on 

 the islands round Taseralik as well as in Upernivik District, 

 Melville Bay and Smith Sound. In other places its occurrence 

 is more sporadic. On the east coast it rarely appears at the 

 southern part, but at Scoresby Sound it is in summer of com- 

 paratively frequent occurrence out at the coast and also 

 farther north, and it has been observed as for north as at 

 Amdrup Land (lat. 81 10' N.). North of this locality it has 

 not been met with, nor in the part of the north coast which 

 faces the Arctic Sea proper. 



"In the Thule District the walrus is of such great importance 

 that it must be termed the chief animal of capture. It also 

 plays a part in the newly established settlement on the east 

 coast at Scoresby Sound. To the remaining part of Greenland 

 it is of no great importance. " 



In its eastward range the walrus seems to have been always 

 scarce about Iceland, straggling on occasion to the British 

 Isles, but it was not regularly to be found in numbers until the 

 colder waters are reached on the north coasts of Finmark, and 

 about the islands to the north and east, Bear Island, Nova 

 Zembla, and particularly Spitsbergen. Concerning their 

 abundance here and their destruction in the course of the last 

 three centuries, J. A. Allen (1880, p. 74) has given a summary 

 account. Even in the early years of the seventeenth century, 

 great numbers were regularly taken at Bear or Cherie Island 

 by expeditions from England, and there was a certain amount 

 of trouble and unfriendly rivalry with crews from Spain, 

 Holland, and Denmark. The intensive slaughter of the wal- 

 ruses at Bear Island compassed their practical extermination 



