THE SEA-OTTER AND ITS EXTERMINATION 
A FEW summers ago a gentleman with whom I am 
acquainted spent his holiday in shooting and fishing on 
the west coast of Ireland, and in the course of his trip 
procured several fine otter-skins, taken in some of the 
bays of that picturesque district. As these otters lived in 
the sea, my friend, who does not profess to be a naturalist, 
jumped to the conclusion that they were sea-otters; and 
as he had heard of the value attaching to the pelts of the 
latter animal, was not a little elated at having obtained 
such spola opima at such small cost. And it came some- 
what as a shock to him when he heard that otters living 
in the sea were not necessarily sea-otters in the zoological 
sense of the term, and that to procure specimens of the 
latter he would have to journey to the shores of the islands 
and continents of the North Pacific. 
Now although it is improbable that many of my readers 
would be likely to confound an ordinary otter which has 
taken up its residence on the coast with its truly marine 
cousin, yet before entering upon the consideration of the 
habits and impending extermination of the latter, a few 
words relating to some of the leading points of distinction 
between the two animals will scarcely be wasted. 
Ordinary otters, then (of which there are numerous 
species, ranging over nearly all the habitable parts of the 
globe where water is plentiful), are animals nearly allied 
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