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of the rock. The next day I anchored in a small harbour, 

 and during the afternoon a sealing schooner, belonging to 

 Monte Video, came in and anchored. They sent their boat 

 alongside my ship, and informed me that they were in 

 want of bread and flour. These I supplied them with, and 

 told them of the rookery I had passed on the previous day. 

 The master of the sealer was a Greek, and apparently a 

 most unfit man for a sealer, for I afterwards learnt that 

 he had not taken advantage of the information we had 

 given him, and that his take for the whole season was 

 only 750 skins. I subsequently met an American schooner, 

 the Golden West and she went up to the Covadanga Group, 

 acting upon our information, and filled right up there with 

 very fine skins. 



The western channels between Patagonia and the islands 

 immediately marked by the Pacific Ocean, are studded with 

 rocky islets the home of fur seal ; during the season it is 

 sojourning in those waters. 



Let us trace the modus operandi of the sealer from the date 

 when, the defects of the previous cruise made good, he is 

 lying waiting to take in his stores and proceed to his sealing 

 ground. One of the principal matters of business to be 

 arranged, is the purchase of his stores and provisions, 

 and this is done in the following "way. There are certain 

 traders in Sandy Point who supply all the needful stores 

 on credit, to be paid for in skins on the termination of the 

 voyage, and with few exceptions, the bargains struck are 

 greatly in favour of the trader. With the usual improvi- 

 dence of sailors, the seal-hunter, only too glad to put off 

 the evil day, when the stores upon which he is to subsist 

 for months have to be paid for, is willing to sign any agree- 

 ment, and consequently the wily trader generally manages 

 to get the sealer into his own hands, very much upon the 



