280 HUNTERS OF THE GREAT NORTH 



insurance policy — it is unnecessary as long as all goes 

 well, but a very good thing to have up your sleeve in case 

 of hard luck. 



The third method of seal hunting is the most important 

 in the sense that most seals are killed by it, but it is 

 so simple that it is -hardly worth describing. Where the 

 offshore ice is broken up, you simply take your station 

 near the edge of the landfast ice early in the morning 

 and watch the water, waiting for a seal to appear. You 

 may see none when you first arrive at the open water, 

 and you may see none all day. It has happened to me 

 that I have sat at the edge of open water day after day 

 for a week without seeing a seal. But luck will turn 

 and eventually they will come. 



It has also happened that when I came to the edge of 

 the water in the early morning I saw dozens of seals 

 within shooting distance and had as many as I wanted 

 killed within a few minutes. In traveling we never want 

 more than one at a time, but when we are spending the 

 winter in some settled camp we like to secure enough in 

 the fall to last all winter. We seldom succeed in doing 

 that, however, and usually it is necessary even when 

 living in one place to do at least a little hunting during 

 the winter. In a way this is really best for it keeps camp 

 life from becoming monotonous. 



The only point about hunting seals in open water is 

 that you must shoot them through the head. When 

 spying around, the seal will often lift himself out of the 

 water so high that you could shoot him through the heart, 

 but if you make an opening through his body, and espe- 

 cially if you perforate the lungs, he is very likely to sink. 

 At the hunting season in the fall, we estimate that of seals 

 shot through the head nine out of ten will float. If seals 



