90 THE FUR SEALS OF THE PRIBILOF ISLANDS. 



have left the islands and started on their first trip southward we do not know, but we 

 do know that a very large proportion of those that set out never return, and the most 

 probable suggesti6n is that they perish of starvation from failure to catch the neces- 

 sary food, being abruptly weaned and forced to shift for themselves before they have 

 had an opportunity to learn the art of fishing. 



Little can be said regarding the deaths among adult seals except those which 

 occur on the rookery grounds and are the direct outcome of fights among the bulls or 

 ill treatment of females by the males. As a rule these happen early in the season, for not 

 one of the 129 cows and 28 bulls found on the breeding grounds in 1896 was sufBciently 

 well preserved to permit of an autopsy. In all probability comparatively few bulls 

 perish directly on the rookeries, the 2S bodies found being those of such as were killed 

 outright or so desperately mauled that retreat was im possible. B ut many a vanquished 

 bull escapes only to die and many another dies after the season is over, lying down to 

 sleep his last sleep on the slopes about Middle Hill, where the bones of many an old 

 veteran lie bleaching on the sands. The shore of English Bay, from Tolstoi to beyond 

 Middle Hill, is indeed an ancient cemetery, not only for thousands of pups and scores 

 of bulls, but for many a sea lion and an occasional sea otter ' as well. A 5-year old male, 

 found dead on Zoltoi sands, affords a hint of the manner in which many a rookery dis- 

 pute must terminate, especially when a young bull ventures, or a bachelor blunders, 

 inside the line of breeding seals; bitten about the flippers, bruised about the neck, 

 this ejected youngster had taken to the sea only to exchange one mode of death for 

 another, escaping from the jaws of an irate bull only to perish by drowning. But if 

 most of the bulls which are killed during the breeding season die outside the rookeries 

 the reverse is probably true of the cows, whose deaths either result from the efforts of 

 the bulls to prevent them from leaving the harems, or from the attempts of the bulls 

 to appropriate cows belonging to their neighbors. In either case the cows are liable 

 to undergo rough treatment, and although they receive the most savage bites without 

 ilinching, many undoubtedly die of their wounds. Ordinarily a bull merely expos- 

 tulates with a cow in very vigorous seal language, but now and then he will lose his 

 temper, and with a rapid stroke cut a gash in the female's neck or shoulder, or make 

 his teeth meet in her back.^ Or, occasionally a nervous bull will seize some hesitating 

 cow by the back and with a toss of his head hurl her 10 feet away, usually without 

 serious injury, but now and then with fatal results. Such a case was seen on the reef 

 in 1897, where a female lying on her back among the bowlders was found to have her 

 skull as neatly fractured as if it had been done with a club, a bite in the small of the 

 back intimating rather plainly that the perpetrator of the deed was an ugly -tempered 

 bull. 



While such things may happen at any time, they usually occur in the early part of 

 the season, and are most frequent where the harems are small and the idle bulls which 

 are so fruitful a source of disturbance, most numerous. This in 1896 was the state of 

 affairs toward the southwestern portion of N'ortheast Point, where the quarreling and 

 clamor were incessant. Many of the cows, and some of the pups as well, were badly 

 scarred, one cow being specially noticeable from the fact that a patch of skin C inches 



I Bones of the sea otter are now very seldom found, here, as they have mostly boon collected. 



•' A good example of such an occurrence -was witnessed during the first visit to St. Georo-e Zapadni 

 when an ill-tempered hull with hut oue cow cut a gash 6 inches long in her neck with a single quick 

 snap, while on Lukanin, in 1897, a vicious hull literally tore one of the newly arrived cows to pieces. 



