GO HABITS OF THE FUR-SEALS. 



Testimonyofc. the nursing females had already extended their 



n. Townsend. 



food excursions even in the last days of July. 1 

 The same witness states that on the 27th of 

 July, 1892, large numbers of the females were 

 away from the rookeries on St. Paul Island, and 

 that four-fifths of the seals on the breeding 

 grounds were pups. 1 It may be noticed in this 

 connection that this was the same date at which 

 the British Commissioners arrived on the Islands 

 in 1891 (Sec. 759), when they state that "the 

 rookeries were still at their fullest" (Sec. 3). Mr. 

 Tostimony of J. Stanley-Brown, whose special study of seal life 



Stanley-Brown. J I J 



on the Islands in 1891 and 1892 has made his 

 opinions of the utmost value, states that the 

 females leave the rookeries within fourteen or 

 seventeen days after the birth of their pups, and 

 lie shows by what observations he became con- 

 vinced of the fact. 2 



4. Aquatic coition. 

 m Affirmation of The Report states that "most writers," tor cer- 



its possibility by 



tho Report. tain reasons, have advanced "an erroneous state- 



ment" that the place where fecundation of the 

 female seals occurs is on the land (Sec. 295). 

 The Commissioners affirm, on the contrary, that it 

 is not only possible for seals to copulate in the 



1 rost p. 393. 

 8 I'osi p. 386. 



