steller's account of 'J'he fur seal. 201 



The internal organs — heart, kidneys, and liver — are very tough, and we did not try 

 to do much with them, because we had a great abundance of meat without. 



A full-grown animal weighs about 8,000 pounds, or 80 hundredweight, or 200 

 Russian '■^pnd." There is so large a number of these animals about this one island 

 that they would suffice to support all the inhabitant's of Kamchatka. 



The manatee is infested with a peculiar insect something like a louse, which is 

 wont to occupj^ and inhabit in great numbers especially the wrinkled arms, the udder, 

 the teats, the pudenda, the anus, and the rough hollows of the skin. When they bore 

 through the cuticle and the cutis, here and there wart-like prominences are produced 

 by the lymjihatic moisture that exiules. So these insects attract tlie gulls to perch 

 upon the backs of the animals and hunt this dainty with their sharp beaks, thus 

 rendering the animals, which are worried by the vermin, a friendly and welcome 

 service. 



These insects are for the most part half an inch long, articulated, six-footed, 

 translucent, white or yellowish. The head is oblong, sharp, larger than a millet seed. 

 In front extend two short, jointed little antenna^ half a line long. In place of a lower 

 mandible it has two slender, two jointed little arms like a shrimp, very sharp and 

 pointed on the end. Furthermore, in accordance with the number of his feet, he is com- 

 posed of six articulations, convex on the back, and one-third of a line wide. But 

 the rii]g of the thorax is twice as wide, and they grow narrower toward the tail. The 

 ring of the thorax resembles the half of a lentil. On the sides of this a pair of thick 

 claws grows, with two joints each. Each claw ends in a flexible point, by means of 

 which it holds fast to the skin of the manatee; the rest of the legs are rather slender, 

 all ending in prickly points, and gradually shorter. The last two are the shortest, 

 and, growing out from the orbicular ring of the tail, form the end of the body itself 

 and steer the insect as it moves. 



THE HABITS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SEA BEAR. 



Dampier has given us a description of this animal, called Kot by the Russians, 

 which is, to be sure, brief and imperfect; but he mentions its characteristics so 

 definitely and plainly and so clearly at flirst sight that I can not doubt that the 

 animal is his " sea bear." 



Report, as I gather from the account of the jjeople, has declared that the sea bear, 

 as it is called by the Rutheni and other people, is different. They say it is an amphib- 

 ious sea beast very like the bear, but very fierce, both on laud and in the water. 

 They told, likewise, that in the year 1736 it had overturned a boat and torn two men 

 to pieces; that they were very much alarmed when they heard the sound of its voice, 

 which was like the growl of a bear, and that they fled from their chase of otter and 

 seals on the sea and hastened back to land. They say that it is covered with white 

 fur; that it lives near the Kuril Islands, and is more numerous toward Japan; that 

 here it is seldom seen. I myself do not know how far to believe this report, for no 

 one has ever seen one, either slain or cast up dead upon the shore. 



This is certain, whether we consider the appearance of the body or the habits of 

 the beast, it is more nearly related and more similar to no other land animal than to 

 a bear. 



They are never seen in the gulf of the Penshin Sea nor in the land of Kam- 

 chatka, nor do they go on shore in the Kuril Islands except very seldom ; they are 



