276 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



Armed with lances and heavy axes, they stealthily approach the walruses, and 

 having disposed their ranks, suddenly fall upon them with loud shouts, and en- 

 deavor to drive them from the sea, taking care that none of them escape into 

 the water, as in that case the rest would irresistibly follow and precipitate the 

 huntsmen along with them. As soon as the walruses have been driven far 

 enough up the strand, the Aleuts attack them with their lances, striking at 

 them in places where the hide is not so thick, and then pressing with all their 

 might against the spear, to render the wound deep and deadly. The slaughter- 

 ed animals tumble one over the other and form large heaps, whilst the hunts- 

 men, uttering furious shouts and intoxicated with carnage, wade through the 

 bloody mire. They then cleave the jaws and extract the tusks, which are the 

 chief objects of the slaughter of several thousand walruses, since neither their 

 flesh nor their fat is made use of in the colony. The carcasses are left on the 

 shore to be washed away by the spring tides, which soon efface the mark of the 

 massacre, and in the following year the inexhaustible north sends new victims 

 to the coast. 



Sir George Simpson, in his " Overland Journey round the World," relates 

 that the bales of fur sent to Kiachta are covered with walrus hide ; it is then 

 made to protect the tea-chests which find their way to Moscow, and after all 

 these wanderings, the far-travelled skin returns again to New Archangel, where, 

 cut into small pieces and stamped with the company's mark, it serves as a me- 

 dium of exchange. 



The skin of the sea-lion {Otaria Stelleri) has but little value in the fur- 

 trade, as its hair is short and coarse, but in many other respects the unwieldy 

 animal is of considerable use to the Aleut. Its hide serves to cover his baL 

 dar ; with the entrails he makes his water-tight kamleika, a wide, long shirt 

 which he puts on over his dress to protect himself against the rain or the 

 spray ; the thick webs of its flippers furnish excellent soles for his boots, and 

 the bristles of its lip figure as ornaments in his head-dress. 



