THE AECTIO SEA-COW: STELLEE'S ACCOUNT. 131 



manners of these animals before the door of my hut. Hence in a few words I will subjoin the 

 facts which were most faithfully observed by me. 



"These animals love shallow and sandy places about the shore of the sea, but most willingly 

 spend their time about the mouths of rivers and small streams, allured by the pleasant motion of 

 the running waters, and they are always found in herds. In feeding they drive before them those 

 who are tender and not yet full grown, surround them carefully on the flanks and in the rear, and 

 always keep them in the middle of the herd, and when the tide is risen they approach so near the 

 shore that they not only have been often attacked by me with a stick or a spear, but sometimes I 

 stroked their backs even with my hand. 



"Having received any severe injury, they do nothing else than to depart farther from the shore, 

 and after a short time ; having forgotten the injury, they again approach nearer. Whole families of 

 them live most harmoniously as neighbors, the male and female with one full-grown and one young- 

 offspring. They seem to me to be monogamous; they produce their young at any season of the 

 year, but most commonly in the autumn, as I inferred from the number of new-born young seen 

 about that time; and from the fact that I observed them in sexual intercourse most especially in 

 the early spring I concluded that the period of gestation covers more than a year, and fiom the 

 shortness of the horns and the dual number of the breasts I conclude that they produce not more 

 than a single calf, and besides I never observed more than one calf near a mother. 



"Moreover, these animals eat most voraciously and without limit, and on account of too great 

 greed have the head always under the water. They are not at all anxious about life or safety, so 

 that in a boat or as a naked swimmer you can go into their midst and safely select whichever one 

 you wish to strike with the harpoon. Four or five minutes having been passed in this intense 

 devotion to eating, they breathe out air and a little water with a noise like the neighing of horses. 

 Wnile feeding they move one foot after another slowly forward and so partly swim quietly, partly, 

 as it were, walk after the manner of feeding cows or sheep. Half of the body, the back and sides, 

 always rises above the water. During the feeding of the Ehytina, gulls are wont to sit on his 

 back and refresh themselves with the fleas clinging to his skin in the same way as crows are wont 

 to feed on the fleas which infest hogs and sheep. Moreover, they do not devour all sea-i>lants 

 promiscuously, but especially, (1) a fucus with the crisped leaf of the Savoy cabbage, (2) a club- 

 shaped fucus, (3) a fucus with the form of an ancient Eomanwhip, (4) a very long fucus with wavy 

 edges whose sinuses reach to the nerves. 



" Where they have pastured even for a single day great heaps of roots and stems are seen thrown 

 out by the waves upon the shore. When their bellies are filled some among them, lying on their 

 backs, sleep, and retreating farther from the shore, lest they should be left on dry ground by the 

 receding tide, are often choked in winter by the ice floating around the shore, which also happens 

 if, caught by the waves dashing violently about the rocks, they are thrown against the latter. In 

 winter these animals are so lean that besides the spine all the ribs appear. Coition takes place 

 in the spring, and especially about evening, in a tranquil sea. They perform many gambols in 

 anticipation. The female swims quietly hither and thither in the sea while the male continually 

 pursues. For a long time the female eludes him with many turnings and meanderiugs until herself 

 impatient of further delay, as if wearied and overpowered, she throws herself on her back, when the 

 male, rushing upon her furiously, extorts the tributum Veneris and both mutually embrace. 



"Their capture was accomplished with a great iron harpoon, the point of which resembled the 

 flattened blade of an anchor fluke, and the other extremity, with the aid of an iron ring, was 

 fastened to a very long and strong cable. A vigorous man took this harpoon, and, together with 

 four or five others, embarked in a boat, and while one guided the helm and three or four rowed 



