306 OUR ARCTIC PROA'INCE. 



A few stragglers remain, however, as late as the snow and ice 

 will permit them to, in and after December ; then thej' are down 

 by the water's edge, and haul up entirely on the rocky beaches, 

 deserting the sand altogether ; but the first snow that falls in Oc- 

 tober makes them very uneasy, and a large hauling-ground will be 

 so disturbed by a rainy day and night that its hundreds of thou- 

 sands of occupants fairly deserted it. The fur-seal cannot bear, 

 and will not endure, the sjjattering of sand into its eyes, which 

 usually accompanies the driving of a rain-storm ; they take to the 

 water, to reappear, however, when that nuisance shall be abated. 



The weather in which the fur-seal delights is cool, moist, foggy, 

 and thick enough to keep the sun always obscured, so as to east no 

 shadows. Such weather, which is the normal weather of St. Paul 

 and St. George, continued for a few^ weeks in June and July, brings 

 up from the sea millions of fur-seals. But, as I have before said, a 

 little sunshine, which raises the temperature as high as 50° tQ 55° 

 Fahr., will send them back from the hauling-grounds almost as 

 quickly as they came. Fortunately, these warm, sunny days on the 

 Pribylov Islands are so rare that the seals certainly can have no 

 ground of complaint, even if we may presume they have any at all. 

 Some curious facts in regard to their selection of certain localities 

 on these islands, and their abandonment of others, are now on record. 



I looked everywhere and constantly, when threading my way 

 over acres of ground which were fairly covered with seal-pups and 

 older ones, for specimens that presented some abnormity, i.e., mon- 

 strosities, albinos, and the like, such as I have seen in our great 

 herds of stock ; but I was, with one or two exceptions, unable to 

 note anything of the kind. I have never seen any malformations or 

 "monsters" among the pups and other classes of the fur-seals, nor 

 have the natives recorded anything of the kind, so far as I could as- 

 certain from them. I saw only three albino pups among the multi- 

 tudes on St. Paul, and none on St. George. They did not di£fer, in 

 any respect, from the normal pups in size and shape. Their hair, 

 for the first coat, w-as a dull ochre all over ; the fur whitish, chang- 

 ing to a rich brown, the normal hue ; the flippers and muzzle were a 

 pinkish flesh-tone in color, and the iris of the eye sky-blue. After 

 they shed, during the following year, they have a dirty, yellowish- 

 white color, which makes them exceedingly conspicuous when 

 mixed in among a vast majority of black pups, gray yearlings, and 

 " hoUuschickie " of their kind. 



