114 VERTEBRATA. MAMMALIA. 



voyager has to pass the night on unsheltered ice, 

 in an atmosphere at Zero. Frozen limbs are fre- 

 quently the result of these exposures, and individuals 

 in their attempts to return, often drop through 

 holes and are seen no more. But this is not all ; 

 for sometimes a sudden change of wind will separate 

 fields of ice on which the men are sealing, and ere 

 they are aware, they are driving far out to sea, 

 helpless and hopeless. But w r e will suppose none 

 of these accidents to have happened, but that the 

 hold being filled with pelts, the vessel returns to 

 her port : this sometimes happens in the course 

 of ten days from departure, but sometimes it is 

 delayed for several weeks. Arrived, the Seals are 

 landed at the wharf, where they were formerly re- 

 ceived by tale ; but of late years by weight, as the 

 fairer mode. They are now to be skinned ; for this 

 purpose a man stands before the skinning -table, an 

 inclined plane reaching from his middle to the 

 ground. He seizes a pelt with his left hand, the 

 fur being downward, then, with a sharp knife, edge 

 outward, he boldly and dexterously cuts between 

 the fat and the skin, the former rolling down in 

 large and long masses, while the latter, though 

 shaved clean, rarely receives a gash. A very expert 

 hand will skin five hundred in a day. The fat as it 

 is skinned is removed to a stage, where it is chopped 

 into small portions, and then pushed into a vat 

 beneath. Here it is allowed to remain, covered 

 from the sun, until the advancing heat of spring 

 melts the fat from the cellular tissue, which, when 



