230 



NATURAL HISTORY. 



and the coasts of Tasmania, belonged to one and the same species. J. R Forster, the naturalist 

 who accompanied Cook, made some spirited sketches (now in the British Museum) of the living 

 forms, which agree in most respects with animals obtained in 18715 by Dr. Hector in New 

 Zealand. In 1773, during his second voyage of circumnavigation, Captain Cook cast anchor 

 in Dusky Bay, New Zealand, and records that he saw great numbers of Seals on the small rocks 

 and islets in this neighbourhood. Forster made careful notes thereon, besides his drawings. He 

 says they are Seals with ears, hands free, feet webbed on. the under surface, naked between the fingers, 

 hardly nailed. Gregarious in habits, they are timid, and fling themselves off the rocks into the sea at 

 the approach of man ; but the most powerful resist when attacked, bite the weapons used against them, 



and even venture to assail the boats. They 

 swim with such rapidity under water that a 

 boat rowed by six strong men can scarcely keep 

 up with them. Tenacious of life to a degree, a 

 fractured skull did not despatch them. The 

 weight of the full-grown is 220 Ibs., of cubs 

 scai-cely 12 Ibs. ; the former are six or seven 

 feet long, the latter barely two and a half. The 

 hair is soft, black, with reddish-grey tips and 

 a delicate reddish under-fur. 



Mr. Clark and Dr. Hector agree as to the 

 general colour. The young are black when wet, 

 when dry, lighter below ; individual hairs pale 

 yellow at base with light yellow tips, and a* 

 dense under-fur of the same tint. The older 

 animals have hairs tipped with white. Round 

 the mouth and ears are pale yellow. These 

 Seals are fast disappearing or retiring to the 

 Southern Antarctic Ocean. They possibly may 

 be found in some of the smaller islands south of 

 New Zealand, such as Auckland and Campbell 

 Islands. On this point, however, information is required, but it has been shown at least that Hooker's 

 Sea Bear frequents these latter, and, as already observed, is known in a sub-fossil state in New 

 Zealand. 



At the beginning of this century the sealing-trade of New South Wales was at its height, and vessels, 

 manned by crews of from twenty-five to thirty men, pursued the craft. Mr. Scott, on the authority of 

 Mr. Morris, an old Sydney sealer by profession, remarks that " to so great an extent was this indiscri- 

 minate killing carried, that in two years (1814-15) no less than 400,000 skins were obtained from 

 Penantipod, or Antipodes Island, alone, and necessarily collected in so hasty a manner that very many 

 of them were but imperfectly cured. The ship Pegasus took home 100,000 of these in bulk, and on her 

 arrival in London, the skins, having heated during the voyage, had to be dug out of the hold, and 

 were sold as manure a sad and reckless waste of life." 



THE ASH-COLOURED OTARY.* It is to be regretted that a memoir on the Eared Seals from 

 the pen of the admirable Peron was lost to science by his lamented early demise. The French 

 savant, when sojourning on the South Atistralian coast at Kangaroo Island, ftmnd a new species 

 of the genus, which he named 0. cinerea, this attaining a length of nine to ten feet. He stated 

 that the hair of this animal is very short, hard, and coarse, but its leather is thick and strong, and 

 the oil prepared from its fat is as good as it is abundant and he recommends pursuit of it 

 and the other Seals with fur of good quality. 



Most likely it is the same animal to which Flinders alludes when he says, speaking of 

 Kangaroo Island, which aboxtnded with Kangaroos and Seals : " They seem to dwell mainly together. 

 It not unfrequently happened that the report of a gun fired at a Kangaroo near the beach brought out 

 two or three bellowing Seals from under the bushes considerably farther from the water-side. The 



ft Otaria (Euotaria) cinerea. 



LEFT FORE (A) AXD HIND (]) FLIPPER OF NEW ZEALAND 



FUR SEAL. (After J. W. Clark.) 



