The Zoologist — November, 18(56. 491 



diet, as many kinds of Crustacea and small marine insects are found 

 in its crop." — p. 10. 



Seals at Home. — " I raised m}- glass and swept the distant view, and 

 then brought it steadily to bear upon the spot. Great indeed was my 

 surprise and pleasure when I descried, for the first time in my life, 

 from a dozen to fifteen of these curious creatures. As we drew nearer 

 the spot, the scene became every moment more intensely exciting, not 

 to say amusing to behold. Varying very materially in size, from six 

 and seven feet long down to three or four, they appeared to be of two 

 kinds, the common seal [Phoca vitulina) and the Greenland or harp 

 seal {P. Greenlandica). Some stretclied out on the bare dry sand, 

 were basking motionless, in evident repose : while others were 

 performing the very drollest antics, pursuing one another in playful 

 mood — propelling their unwieldly bodies in a sort of snake-like 

 manner, with a peculiar undulatory movement of the tail, their shining 

 forms flashing in the clear sunlight, as they disported themselves in 

 gleesome merriment. Some, gliding off the bank dived invisibly 

 away, while others, reappearing from the element at different points, 

 went shuffling along at the edge of the water. As I grasped my rifle 

 with the eagerness of hope, the seal-hunter gravely hinted that our 

 best precautions would be as unavailing as my own aspirations, since 

 the seals upon this bank were always extremely wild, being so 

 often scared by the passage to and fro of vessels'in the Firlh. And 

 true enough ; for as our nearer approach seemed at first to increase at 

 once the life, the interest, and the reality of the scene, and these 

 extraordinary animals loomed more distinctly upon the sight, they all 

 at once, as though the act were preconcerted, in the twinkling of an 

 eye, scuttled simultaneously into the water, where with a violent 

 splashing and vexatious turmoil, they vanished from the sight. Here 

 and there, at various points a vast distance off, they exhibited for a 

 moment their black round heads, resembling in a great degree the 

 larger cannon-shot which in naval practice seem to rest for a moment 

 on the surface of the water ere they finally disappear. * * * We 

 now bore away towards the mouth of the Firlh, making for a bank of 

 larger extent, about two miles off the point of Tarbet Ness. Wherever 

 a point of dry sand came into sight there would seals be lying— the 

 gulls quietly feeding amongst them in the truest spirit of fraterniza- 

 tion."— p. 19. 



The reading and quoting of descriptions like this have a tendency to 

 induce reminiscenses of days gone by, of things qua: ipse vidi et 



