46 SEALS OF THE SHETLAND ISLANDS. 



through it from the bottom from being affected by any 

 agitation on the surface. After often a long and fatiguing 

 search the object is discovered, and the klam is had re- 

 course to. This is a gigantic kind of forceps of peculiar con- 

 struction, attached to two lines, one of which is to suspend 

 it, the other to guide the blades ; it is directed to its ob- 

 ject by means of its help-mate the water-glass ; the jaws 

 close on the Seal, and he is quickly hauled to the surface. 



But all this will not ensure success in the Seal hunt. It 

 is not enough to be a good shot, to be well armed and 

 supplied with every equipment ; the sportsman must also be 

 intimately acquainted with the habits of the animal, and 

 possess great experience and address to avail himself of this 

 knowledge. Many curious devices are put in practice 

 to allure him within shot, and much patience and sagacity 

 to steal upon him unperceived. Often we range along 

 many miles of coast without meeting with a single Seal ; but 

 our wanderings are through scenery the most majestic. 

 Who that has ever looked upon them, can forget these 

 " naked" and primitive isles of the Northern Atlantic — 

 their melancholy moors and lonely valleys — their stupen- 

 dous precipices and foaming surges, lowering clouds, and 

 rushing malstroms, where the ancient lullaby of the infant 

 Viking was the hurricane, and his play-ground the ocean ; in 

 these wild and sequestered solitudes, unbroken by thetumults 

 of faction and the inroads of civilization, is to be found that 

 untrammelled freedom about which philosophers reason, 

 and poets sing ; and it is well to refresh ourselves, in this 

 agitated period of the march of matter, with those pure 

 and ennobling sentiments which the presence of Nature in 

 her sublimer aspects is calculated to inspire. If the fox- 

 hunter has counties to scour, we have islands ; if we want 

 his woodlands and rivers, we have our rocks and ocean; 



