280 DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SEAL AND WALEUS. 



used to propel liim in the water after the 

 manner of fins. 



The resemblance between the seal and the 

 walrus is not in any respect so close, either in 

 their appearance or in their habits, as one would 

 be apt to suppose by looking at the clumsily 

 stuffed specimen of a wabus in the British 

 Museum, or at the few absurd caricatures of 

 this animal which exist. The walrus in every 

 way partakes much more of the natm^e of 

 land-animals than the seal, which again seems 

 more closely allied to the cetaceans. Por 

 instance, the walrus can double his hind-legs 

 under him and walk upon them like any other 

 beast, while the seal always keeps his hinder 

 extremities stretched backward like the tail of 

 a cetacean. The walrus cannot remain under 

 water for nearly so long a period as the seal, 

 neither can he sustain the pressure of the 

 water at anything like the depth to which the 

 great seal can descend : the walrus goes ashore 

 on the beach or rocks, and the great Spitz- 

 bergen seal, although he basks on ice, — both 

 fixed and floating, — is never kno^vn to go on 

 land or even to lie on a half- tide rock ; the wal- 

 rus is gregarious and the great seal solitary, even 

 two seldom being found together ; the young 



