The Sea-Lion's Den 295 



the men use their riatas, and thus rarely miss the lions, 

 who hold their heads high in the air, presenting an easy 

 mark for the roper. The moment the riata falls and the 

 game is caught, the men dash for the rocks, where they 

 can take a turn with their ropes. The lions make a 

 desperate effort to escape ; some break away, bite off 

 the rope, or slip it over their heads ; others reach the 

 water, and the men have to be active to escape the horde 

 of crazed animals, some of which weigh a thousand 

 pounds, which come sliding down the kelp toboggan. 

 After a long struggle the sea-lions are mastered ; the 

 most troublesome are gagged and bound, thrown over 

 and towed to boxes into which they are placed, later 

 being hoisted aboard the launch and carried to Santa 

 Barbara, from which place they are shipped to museums 

 or zoological gardens all over the world. , j 



On Santa Rosa Island, which is twenty miles or more 

 in length, there are several rookeries where many sea- 

 lions can be found in winter, and at San Nicolas, about 

 eighty miles from San Pedro, there are a number. San 

 Nicolas is a region of fierce storms, and to hear the 

 roar of the sea-lions combined with that of the sea, to 

 watch the flying clouds and wild waves piling in, is 

 something I will long remember. We had tried 

 several times to land here, and had been driven off 

 time and again ; but one morning we gained the long 

 sandy spit that like a miniature Cape Cod is reaching 

 out into the sea from San Nicolas. It was on the lee 

 side, but a strong dangerous current was setting along 



