1912] Townsend: Northern Elephant Seal. 167 



Sometimes when the head is turned up, the proboscis relaxes 

 until it hangs into the open mouth. The animal may continue 

 to turn its head over backwards until the half -relaxed proboscis 

 actually overhangs to the rear. We did not at any time see the 

 trunk thrown into a rounded or tubular form. In fighting it is 

 closely retracted and the seal is apparently successful in keeping 

 it out of harm's way, as many of the animals with badly damaged 

 necks, had trunks showing no injury whatever. 



When the proboscis is fully retracted it exhibits three bulg- 

 ing transverse folds on top separated by deep grooves. The 

 upper groove remains distinguishable when the proboscis is re- 

 laxed, while above it the upper fold remains as a fleshy hump. 

 We did not observe any actual inflation of the trunk, which, as 

 examined during the skinning operations, is fibrous and fleshy 

 throughout. There was no special expansion of the nasal pas- 

 sages observable, and while the photographs appear to indicate 

 an inflation, such is not the case ; the heavy folds of the retracted 

 proboscis must be produced by purely muscular action. It can- 

 not be capable of inflation in the sense that the trunk of the male 

 hooded-seal (Cystophora) is inflated. The massing of the heavy 

 fleshy appendage into compact folds on top of the head, is really 

 the opposite of inflation. There is little indication of the pro- 

 boscis in the half -grown male ; it probably does not develop until 

 sexual maturity is reached. Under excitement both female and 

 young extend the nose into a sharply pointed tip. 



A careful examination of all available published photographs 

 of the Antarctic species has failed to show in any case, a pro- 

 boscis as long as those shown in our photographs of the northern 

 species. 



Food. 



I have not found anything in the stomach of the elephant 

 seal that would serve to indicate the nature of its food; in fact 

 we never found anything but a handful of sand. Our captive 

 elephant seals refused to eat fresh fish during the two days voy- 

 age to San Diego and took no food for more than a week after 

 their journey overland. In the New York Aquarium they have 

 subsisted entirely on fresh fish cut into moderate sized pieces, but 



