34 SEALS OF THE SHETLAND ISLANDS. 



them might be to take half-grown animals in a net, or sur- 

 prize them on land, and then keep them in salt-water ponds 

 in a semi-domestic state : if any of them were pregnant when 

 caught, or could be got to breed, the main difficulty would 

 be overcome. Ferhaps also another means of taming ap- 

 plicable to them, as it might be to other wild animals, would 

 be emasculation. 



The hunting of the seal was formerly an object of great 

 importance to Norway and her insular dependencies in 

 the Northern Ocean. The skins were employed in various 

 necessary modes, and their flesh and fat prized, and regu- 

 larly consumed as food. They were, in those times, far 

 more numerous and easy of access than they now are, and 

 in common with horses, whales, sharks, &c, would contri- 

 bute to support a population much superior to what some 

 theoretical writers on history are in the habit of assigning 

 to these regions. When a country, like ancient Scandina- 

 via, consumes within itself every thing in an eatable shape 

 which it produces ; — when such a country swarms with fish, 

 wild fowl, game, seals, and whales ; — its domestic animals 

 perhaps as abundant, and its agriculture as productive, as 

 now ; possessing in its forests, superabundance of fuel, and 

 shelter; and from the maritime habits, and bold, adventurous, 

 and intelligent character of its population, having at all 

 times a ready outlet for its superfluous numbers ; — we can 

 at once conceive how easily the North could supply those 

 swarms of heroes, who were incessantly desolating every 

 coast of Europe, and whose descendants now give law and 

 civilization to many of the fairest portions of the globe. In 

 Shetland even, I know some people still alive who regularly 

 ate the flesh of seals, but the practice is now totally disused. 

 In the Faroe Islands they are still occasionally salted and 

 eaten ; and I believe the Icelanders continue to pay to their 



