ELEPHANT-SEALS OF KBRGUELEN LAND. 433 



By the 10th of JSTovember only a few cows were left, and it 

 had been noticed that each had but one pup to suckle. In several 

 harems there were a few without youngsters ; and these were 

 assumed by us to have been unfecundated. As late as the 21st 

 of the month a dam was seen to have come up to the beach to 

 suckle her pups, and as the youngsters were increasing in fatness 

 for some time after the disappearance of the mother seals to 

 recoup their strength after the exhausting strain of suckling, the 

 dams had evidently returned, now and then, to the beaches 

 before finally abandoning the pups. After Christmas the cows 

 began to reappear, all being in fine condition after their voyage 

 of recuperation, some arriving even earlier, and they now went 

 far up on land to loll about among the bulls changing their coats, 

 and growing slim again, until the month of April when the great 

 exodus of the Elephant-Seals took place. 



In the month of November the weather was fairly fine ; and 

 the pups which, on the departure, or rather the disappearance of 

 the dams, had withdrawn from the beaches and collected on the 

 green slopes above, were seen by the end of the month to 

 approach the water again. The beachmasters had remained to 

 guard their youngsters, and were very prompt to come to their 

 assistance when teased by us. Indeed those bulls, which had 

 been harassed and troul)led by the men, had at last become quite 

 furious, so that the sight of a man was sufficient to drive them 

 into a towering rage. 



Whilst lying on the slopes, the pups were seen to charge each 

 other in clumsy hops, and express their feelings in a kind of 

 hooting- when catching each other up. The male pups also tried 

 to fight one another ; but on liaising their fat, round bodies they 

 generally tumbled over ; and when teased the nose would be 

 puffed up twice its original size. The quivering of the muscles 

 of the face gave the otherwise docile physiognomy of these 

 youngsters quite a ferocious aspect. 



They had decreased considerably in fatness, though grown in 

 length when mustering on the beaches about the 3rd of 

 December : and by the 10th the beachmasters, who were very 

 much reduced in bvilk, and who occasionally would disappear for 

 a coviple of days, doubtless to seek some food, took their departure 

 with their offspring. In the month of February the pups 

 reappeared, the males having grown to a length of about nine 

 feet, whilst the females hardly measured more than seven feet in 

 length. 



The " pods " of bulls or bachelor seals, which on our arrival 

 were seen on the beaches and the flats above, disappeared at 

 various times to feed themselves up, and on their return, after 

 about two months' absence, they resorted far up on land, to spend 

 the remainder of the summer basking in the sunshine on the 

 slopes and plains above the beaches, shedding their hair and 

 growing thin again ; many were seen in the miry troughs or oval 

 hollows made by generations after generations of seals, and others 



