78 NATURAL HISTORY OF AQUATIC ANIMALS. 



pla(;e — the place from whence they were driven the year before — they were scattered examples of 

 croi)piPS from every point on the island. The same experiment was again made by our ])eople in 

 1870 (the natives having- told them of this prior undertaking), and they went also to Lukannon, drove 

 up 100 young males, cut off their left ears, and set them free in turn. Of this number, during tlie 

 summer of 1872, when I was there, the natives found in their driving of 75,000 Seals from the dif- 

 ferent htluling-grouudsof SaintPaulup tothevillage killing-grounds, two on Novostashnah Rookery, 

 ten miles north of Lukannon, and two or three from English Bay and Tolstoi Rookeries, six miles 

 west by water; one or two were taken on Saint George Island, thirty-six miles to the southeast, 

 and not one from Lukannon was found among those that weio driven from there; probably, had 

 all the young males on the two islands this season been examined, the rest of the croppies that had 

 returned from the perils of the deep, whence they sojourned during the winter, would have been 

 distributed quite equally about the Pribylov hauling-grounds. Although the natives say that they 

 think (he catting off of the animal's ear gives the water such access to its head as ( o cause its death, 

 yet I noticed that those examples which we had recognized by this auricular mutilation were 

 normally fat and well developed. Their theory does not appeal to my belief, and it certainly 

 requires confirmation. 



These experiments would tend to prove very cogently and conclusively, that when the Seals 

 approach the islands in the spring, they have nothing in their minds but a general instinctive 

 appreciation of the fitness of the land, as a whole ; and no special fondness or determination to elect 

 any on« particular spot, not even the place of their birth. A study of my map of the distribution 

 of the seal-life on Saint Paul, clearly indicates that the landing of the Seals on the respective 

 rookeries is influenced greatly by the direction of the wind at the time of their approach to the 

 islands in the spring and early summer. The prevailing airs, blowing, as they do at that season, 

 from the north and northwest, carry far out to sea the odor of the old rookery flats, together with 

 the fresh scent of the pioneer bulls which have located themselves on these breeding-grounds, three 

 or four weeks in advance of their kind. The Seals come up from the great North Pacific, and lience 

 it will be seen that the rookeries of the south and southeastern shores of Saint Paul Island receive 

 nearly all the seal-life, although there are miles of perfectly eligible ground at Nahsayvernia, or 

 north shore. To settle this matter beyond all argument, however, I know is an exceedingly difficult 

 task, for the identification of individuals, from one season to another, among the hundreds of 

 thousands, and even miUions, that come under the eye on one of these great rookeries, is well nigh 

 impossible. 



Age op females when fiest pregnant. — As to the time when the virgin cow is first 

 covered by the bull, I found a strange medley of ideas among the people on the island. The com- 

 mon opinion of the others and the natives was, that they were not covered until they wore three 

 years of age, bringing forth their first young in the former case, in the generally accepted version, 

 when they reached their fourth year. But this, on examination, was not a difficult problem at all 

 to solve. The evidence every year decides when the yearlings are driven up to the village in the 

 fall, that although to external appearance thei'e is no difference between the sexes, an examinatiim 

 conclusively established the fact, that the yearling females herded with the yearling males on the 

 hauling-grounds, each about equal in number, and that when the balance of the " Holluschickie.'' 

 two-year-olds and upward, were driven in they never found a female ' in the droves. Where were 

 these two-year-old females then'? They were not upon the hauling-grounds with the yearling females 

 and bachelors. Where were they ? The answer is, they have come up on the breeding-grounds, 

 clothed with desire and supplied with physical life to meet prospective maternity. 



H. e., virile female. 



