452 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



forth her young, a single calf, in June usually, on the ice-iloes in 

 the Arctic Ocean, above Bering Straits, between Point Barrow and 

 Cape Seartze Kammiu ; that this calf resembles the parent in gen- 

 eral proportions and color when it is hardly over six weeks old, but 

 that the tuslcs (which give it its most distinguishing expression) are 

 not visible until the second year of its life ; that the walrus mother 

 is strongly attached to her offspring, and nurses it later through 

 the season in the sea ; that the walrus sleeps profoundly in the 

 water, floating almost vertically, with barely more than the nostrils 

 above water, and can be easily aj^proached, if care is taken as to the 

 Avind, so as to spear it or thrust a lance into its bowels ; that the 

 bulls do not fight as savagely as the fur-seal or the sea-lion ; that 

 the blunted tusks of these combatants seldom do more than bruise 

 their thick hides ; that they can remain under water nearly an hour, 

 or about twice as long as the seals, and that they sink like so many 

 stones immediately after being shot at sea. 



I personally made no experiments touching the jjeculiarity of 

 sinking immediately after being shot. Of course, on reflection, it 

 will appear to any mind that all seals, no matter how fat or how lean, 

 Avould sink instantly out of sight, if not killed, at the shock of a 

 bullet ; even if mortally wounded, the great involuntary imi^ulse 

 of brain and muscle would be to dive and speed away, for all swim- 

 ming is submarine when pinnipeds desire to travel. 



Touching this mooted question, I had an opportunity when in 

 Port Townsend, during 1874, to ask a man who had served as a 

 j)artner in a fur-sealing schooner oft' the Straits of Fuca. He told 

 me that unless a seal was instantly killed by the passage of his 

 rifle-bullet through its brain, it was never secured, and would sink 

 before they could reach the bubbling wake of its disappearance. 

 If, however, the aim of a marksman had been correct, then its body 

 was invariably taken within five to ten minutes after the rifle dis- 

 charge. Only one man does the shooting ; the rest of such a 

 crew, ten to twelve white men and Indians, man canoes and boats 

 which are promptly despatched from the schooner, after each re- 

 port, in the direction of a victim. How long one of the bodies 

 of these " clean " killed seals would float he did not know; the 

 practice always was to get it as quickly as possible, fearing that 

 the bearings of its position, when shot from a schooner, might be 

 confused or lost. He also aflSrmed that, in his opinion, there were 

 not a dozen men on the whole northwest coast who were good 



