THE SEAL OFTEN ESCAPES. 107 



in the use of both of which organs U. maritimus is 

 unsurpassed by any wild animal whose acquaint- 

 ance I have ever made, and then slipping into the 

 water half a mile or so to leeward of his prey, he 

 swims slowly and silently toward him, keeping very 

 little of his head above water. On approaching 

 the ice on which the seal is lying, the bear slips 

 along unseen under the edge of it* until he is close 

 under the hapless seal, when one jump up and one 

 blow of his tremendous paw generally settles the 

 business. The seal can not go fast enough to es- 

 cape by crossing to the other side of the iceberg ; 

 if he jumps down when the bear is close to him he 

 does the best he can for his life, for, if he does not 

 jump actually into the arms of his foe and gets 

 into the water, he is very likely to escape, the bear 

 having no chance whatever when the seal is once 

 fairly afloat. It can not be very easy, even for an 

 animal of such prodigious strength as the Polar 

 bear, to keep hold of a six-hundred weight seal dur- 

 ing the first contortions of the latter, and a furious 

 struggle must often take place. That the seals oft- 

 en escape from the grasp of the bear is certain, for 

 we ourselves shot at least half a dozen of large seals 

 which were deeply gashed and scored by the claws 

 of bears. It is evidently fear of the bear which 

 makes the seals so uneasy and restless when they 



* I have been told the bear will dive to avoid being seen by 

 the seal, and, as we once saw a bear dive ourselves, I can quite 

 easily credit the fact. 



