260 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



its outer extremity up to the body-connection. It is sensibly 

 tougher and thicker than elsewhere on the body ; it is deeply and 

 regularly wrinkled with seams and furrows, which cross one an- 

 other so as to leave a kind of sharp diamond-cut pattern. When 

 they are placed by the animal upon the smoothest rocks, shining 

 and slippery from algoid growths and the sea-polish of restless 

 waters, they seldom fail -to adhere. 



When we observe this seal moving out on the land, we notice 

 that, though it handles its fore-feet in a most creditable manner, it 

 brings up its rear in quite a different style : for, after every second 

 step ahead with the anterior limbs it will arch its spine, and in arch- 

 ing, it drags and lifts up, and together forward, the hind-feet, to a 

 fit position under its body, giving it in this manner fresh leverage 

 for another movement forward by the fore-feet, in which the spine 

 is again straightened out, and then a fresh hitch is taken up on 

 the posteriors onee more, and so on as the seal progresses. This is 

 the leisurely and natural movement on land, when not disturbed, the 

 body all the time being carried clear of and never touching the 

 ground ; but if the creature is frightened, this method of progi-es- 

 sion is radically changed. It launches into a lope and actually gal- 

 lops so fast that the best powers of a man in running are taxed to 

 head it off. Still, it must be remembered that it cannot run far be- 

 fore it sinks, trembling, gasping, breathless, to the earth. Thirty or 

 forty yards of such speed marks the utmost limit of its endurance. 



The radical difference in the form and action of the hind-feet 

 cannot fail to strike the eye at once. They are one-seventh longer 

 than the fore-hands and ver}'- much lighter and more slender ; they 

 resemble, in broad terms, a pair of black-kid gloves, flattened out 

 and shrivelled, as they lie in their box. 



There is no suggestion of fingers on the fore-hands ; but the 

 hind-feet seem to be toes run into ribbons, for they literally flap 

 about involuntarily from that point where the cartilaginous pro- 

 cesses unite with the phalangeal bones. The hind-feet are also 

 merged in the body at their junction with it, like those anterior. 

 Nothing can be seen of the leg above the tarsal joint. 



The shape of the hind flipper is strikingly like that of a human 

 foot, provided the latter were drawn out to a length of twenty or 

 twenty-two inches, the instep flattened down and the toes run out 

 into thin, membranous, oval-tipped points, only skin-thick, leaving 

 three strong cylindrical, grayish, horn-colored nails, half an inch 



