steller's account of the sea lion. 209 



hunt and makes tliem ready for hazardous- enterprises. They often load their boats 

 with two or even three of these animals, till they threaten to sink in the water. But 

 they are so skillful that this seldom happens in the smooth sea, even though the rim 

 of the boat may be even with the surface of the water. They consider it a great 

 disgrace if, through fear of death, they abandon the quarry that they have once secured, 

 so that if their hands should not avail to bail out the water they would sink. To 

 hunt this beast the bravest men go out to sea in their light canoes four or five German 

 miles to the uninhabited island called Alait. And itnotinfrequently happens that the 

 sailors without a compass are taken by a contrary wind four, five, or even eight days 

 out to sea without anything to eat, and see neither island nor mainland, and have 

 only the rising and setting of the sun and moon to direct them. 



The blubber, as well as the sweet flesh, is well flavored and highly prized, and 

 the gelatinous flippers are considered a prime delicacy. The fat is not greasy, like 

 that of seals and whales, but is stiff, and resembles that of sea bears in color, but 

 not in flavor and smell. The fat of the young is sweeter than mutton tallow and 

 resembles the marrow of leg bones. From the skin they make thongs, the soles of 

 shoes, and even shoes themselves and leggins. 



They are polygamous. One male has two, three, or four females. The pups are 

 born on land about the beginning of June — one only at a birth, and are suckled by their 

 mothers. They come together in August and September, hence the young remains in 

 the womb nine months, as indeed seems reasonable. They copulate like the sea bears. 

 The males hold the females in great respect and do not treat them so harshly as the 

 sea bears do their wives. They delight exceedingly in the caresses of the females 

 and count their affection worthy of much more demonstrative return. The males, like 

 the females, have a very indiflerent love for the pups. The mothers when asleep some- 

 times crush the young at their udders by their weight and kill them, as I have often 

 seen, and they were not the least bit disturbed when, as often, I cut the throats of the 

 young, even before the eyes of their j)arents and threw the entrails to them. The^ pups 

 are not so lively and active as those of the sea bears, but sleep all the time or play a 

 little in a lazy way, and indulge in amatory sports. At eventide the mothers with the 

 young go out into the sea and swim quietly near the shore. When the pups get tired 

 of swimming they are wont to perch upon the backs of their ipothers and rest. But 

 the mother rolls over like a wheel and shakes the lazy pups oil', and accustoms them to 

 swimming. As an experiment I have thrown young sea bears and equally young sea 

 lions into the water; but they were so far from being able to swim or to use their flip- 

 pers well that they beat the waves irregularly with their flippers and hurried to the 

 shore. The pups are twice as large as those of sea bears. 



Although these animals are exceedingly afraid of man, yet I have seen them grow 

 used to him and become tame by meeting him frequently without i'njury, and especially 

 at that time when the pups had not yet learned to swim easily. I lived a season in 

 the midst of a heid of them, and for six whole days on a spot above them, where from 

 my hut I watched their habits carefully. They lay around me in every direction ; they 

 watched my fire and what I did, and did not run away any longer even when I walked 

 around among them and took their pups and killed them and examined them. They 

 practiced coition, fought jealously for their wives and for the best places, and fought 

 most bitterly in just the same, way and with the same motions and the same hdat as 

 the sea bears do. One from whom a female had been taken fought with all the rest for 

 5947— FT 3 M 



