458 THE ESKIMO AND THE SEAL. 



play no unimportant part. They do not pursue it on the 

 extensive scale adopted by the Americans or Europeans : 

 but they know the value of the seal, and they continually 

 hunt it down. The net, the harpoon, the club, the rifle, 

 all these weapons are employed against the unfortunate 

 phoca. It is useful to man, and man, accordingly, has 

 no mercy upon it. He watches by its air-hole in the ice, 

 and prepares to strike it on its rising to the surface. Or 

 he clothes himself in seal-skins, or in garments of the 

 same colour and shape, and posting himself on a weedy, 

 surf-beaten rock, he imitates its peculiar cry, and having 

 enticed it within range, delivers a mortal blow. Does 

 man ever spare any creature which is necessary to his 

 comfort or his ease 1 



"When a seal-hole is found, the Eskimo wraps himself 

 in his warmest furs, and, with his spear in his hand, 

 stations himself beside it ; sitting there for hours, silent, 

 motionless, vigilant, and occasionally thrusting his spear 

 through the snow to strike, and make sure of, the small 

 aperture leading through the ice. In aiming at a seal, it 

 will not do to miss the exact spot where the animal comes 

 to breathe ; no, not by a quarter of an inch. To know 

 this exact spot the Eskimo will frequently place over it 

 some trifling mark, and then, when he hears the seal 

 blow, down speeds the fatal spear, and the animal is 

 captured. 



"The shyness of the seal," says Dr. Kane, "is pro- 

 verbial. The Eskimos, trained from earliest youth to the 

 pursuit of them, regard a successful hunter as the great 

 man of the settlement. If not killed instantaneously, 

 the seal sinks and is lost." 



On one occasion, when near Ovinde Oerme, in Melville 



