IN AUDUBON'S LABRADOR 



and may it always have as good a keeper as 

 old Joe Galibois! — we explored the island- 

 crowded bays leading up to the outlet of the 

 Darby River. Windlasses on favorable points 

 showed where nets were stretched to catch 

 the seals returning from the bay. The seal- 

 netting season extends from the middle of 

 November until the last of December, but of 

 late years this, like the other harvests of the 

 sea on the Labrador cocist, has fallen off. From 

 time to time in our summer voyage we saw 

 a seal stick his head above the water and 

 gaze open-eyed at our boat; but they were far 

 from abundant and nearly all harbor seals, a 

 species still common in places on the New Eng- 

 land coast. People here call them loup-marin 

 d'esprit, while the larger harp seal, the seal of 

 the Newfoundland Labrador, is called loup- 

 marin hrasseur. We saw one gray seal, called 

 here the horse-head seal, a beast sometimes 

 nearly twice as large as the harbor seal. 



The bay proved to be well worth exploring, 

 full of steep, rounded islands and abounding 

 in the two birds that can best withstand the 

 assaults of the fishermen. These are the razor- 

 billed auk — the tinker of the English, the 

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