
- above the rookeries to pass the night. 

Dec. 22, 1870] 
NATURE 
149 

vations, occupy at this season a belt of loose rocks along | SCIENTIFIC TEACHING IN ELEMENTARY 
the shore, varying in width from five to forty rods. Twelve 
miles of shore line at least are taken up by what is called 
their “ drxeeding rookeries” in this island, and are tenanted 
by not less than 1,152,000 breeding males and females, 
according to Captain Bryant’s estimate. Each male seal 
stations himself in a particular spot, usually the same as 
he has occupied in former years, and keeps about a square 
rod of ground free around him to afford space for the 
reception of his ten or fifteen wives. By the 15th of June 
all the males have arrived, and have stationed themselves 
each in his own domain, not without constant growlings 
and fightings with his neighbours for what he considers 
the best station. The young males are not allowed 
to take a place in the “rookeries,” but are driven by the 
patriarchs back into the sea, or compelled to resort to the | 
high rocks above. After the middle of June, the females 
arrive ; in small numbers at first, but increasing as the 
season advances, until the middle of July, by which time 
they are so crowded together that they often overlap one | 
another. The old males who are nearest the shore seize 
upon the females at once, and of course fill their harems 
first. But the males who are higher up on the rocks select 
the time when their more fortunate neighbours are off 
guard to steal their wives, taking them up in their mouths, 
and carefully carrying them off to their own dominions, as 
a cat would her kittens. Struggles often occur between 
two males for the possession of the same female, and both 
seizing her at once, terribly lacerate her with their teeth. 
When his harem is full, the old male struts compla- 
cently around reviewing his domestic circle, and fiercely 
driving off all intruders. Two or three days after landing 
and taking up her abode, the female brings forth her 
single pup, after which she is ready to associate with 
the male. By the middle of August the young are all 
born, and the females are again pregnant. ‘The old males 
having been constantly in their stations for four months 
without food, now leave the females and young to the 
company of the younger males, and go off-shore to feed. 
At the end of October the whole body of seals leave the 
island and journey southwards. 
The greatest care is taken by the hunters never to dis- 
turb the breeding places of the seals in any way, and the 
only seals killed for the sake of their fur are the younger 
animals (principally males) that resort to the higher rocks 
A party of men 
armed with clubs surround a portion of the herd and drive 
them off sometimes six or seven miles across the island, to 
the place selected for killing and skinning them. By this 
plan the rookeries are less liable to be alarmed, and the 
seals are made to carry their own skins to the salting 
houses, which would otherwise be a work of much labour, 
At the present time the annual yield of seal-skins from 
the Pribyloff Islands is estimated to have reached 109,000, 
and the killing yearly of this number is believed in no way 
to check their increase, but rather to augment it. 
This short sketch will serve to give an idea of Captain 
Bryant’s account of the extraordinary habits of this 
animal, and of the way in which the large annual supply 
of the much-valued seal-skin coats of civilised life is 
produced. Many other details of the highest interest are 
added, for which we must refer our readers to the original 
article. Although several accounts have been already pub- 
lished of the habits of other species of this group, none, we 
believe, is so full and perfect as the present, which forms a 
valuable appendix to Mr. Allen’s excellent essay already 
spoken of. In short, it may be truly said that, by this 
single memoir, more extensive knowledge has been gained | 
concerning this little-known group of mammals than by 
the half-dozen different systems of arrangement of them 
which have lately emanated from the British Museum, 
and the publication of an indefinite number of (so-called) 
tiew genera and species founded upon stray skulls and 
imperfect skins, — Pe ls: 
i 
SCHOOLS 
HE following address, signed by Prof. Huxley, as 
President of the British Association, has been 
presented to the Vice-President of the Council by a 
deputation, consisting of the President of the Association 
the General Secretaries, and the Treasurer ; Sir Charles 
Lyell, Bart. ; Sir John Lubbock, Bart. M.P.; Dr, Lyon 
Playfair, M.P. ; and Mr, Francis Galton : : 
“The deputation from the Council of the British As- 
sociation for the Advancement of Science waits upon you 
for the purpose of urging the advisability of including 
elementary Natural Science among the subjects for which 
payments are to be made under the authority of the 
Revised Code. We have asked you to ‘receive us at the 
present time because we understand that you have an- 
nounced your intention of making certain modifications 
in the Code. Our reasons for requesting you to give 
direct encouragement to the teaching of Natural Science 
in elementary schools are three. Firstly, we conceive 
such teaching to be one of the best instruments of educa- 
tion in the sense of intellectual discipline, and in many 
respects better calculated to awaken intellectual activity 
than other studies ; secondly, we think that a knowledge 
of the elements of Natural Science has a high value as 
information ; and thirdly, we are of opinion that scientific 
training and teaching in the elementary schools will afford 
the best possible preparation for that technical education 




ge 
| of the working classes which has become indispensably 

necessary to the industrial progress of the country. 
“We take the liberty of pointing out to you that, in 
asking for the introduction of scientific teaching into the 
elementary schools, we are not seeking for the creation of 
a new system or even of new executive machinery. The 
Science and Art Department does already provide for 
elementary scientific instruction ; and all that is necessary 
to fulfil our desire is, that the system of the Science and 
Art Department and that of the Revised Code shall be 
brought into harmonious co-operation. In preferring the 
request that instruction in the elements of Science shall 
be made part of the regular course of instruction of all 
elementary schools, we desire carefully to guard against 
the supposition that we are seeking for such an amount 
of this kind of instruction as would interfere with the 
teaching of reading, writing, and arithmetic, and the other 
essential constituents of primary education. On the 
contrary, we think it very desirable that systematic 
instruction in elementary Science should be given only to 
those scholars who are able to read and write fairly ; 
that it should be limited to certain well-defined subjects, 
such for example as elementary physical geography, 
elementary physics and chemistry, elementary botany, 
and, in consequence of its relation to the public health, 
elementary human physiology ; and that care should be 
taken to make the instruction, so far as may be, real and 
practical. : 
“Finally, we desire to point out that such scientific in- 
instruction in the elementary schools as we pray for, would 
afford a means by which any child of exceptional aptitude 
for scientific pursuits might obtain the education suited to 
its capacity in the higher schools, and that in this way 
advantages similar to those which are offered by the 
scholarships and exhibitions of grammar-schools to the 
children of the well-to-do classes of society, would be ex- 
tended to the poor and necessitous. In other countries 
in which well-organised systems of secondary education 
for the working classes exist, it has been found necessary 
to give a taste for Science in the elementary schools, so 
that the youth of the country may be induced to take 
advantage of the more advanced schools, While, there- 
fore, we look with pleasure to the introduction of Science 
into the endowed schools of the country, we still believe 
that it will be necessary to link them to the elementary 
schools by commencing instruction in Science inthe latter,” 
