WILD ANIMALS IN CAPTIVITY 
feathers, leaving only the down, which fairly represents 
the fur left on the seal-skin after the hairs have been 
removed. The hair seals cannot be treated in this manner, 
as they do not possess the same kind of undercoat of fur, 
and, consequently, if plucked or denuded of hair, would be 
useful only as leather. 
The everlasting slaughter of the fish-eating animals has 
been carried on year after year for ages with increasing 
skill ; with the aid of steamships, and with the great 
improvement in fire-arms, it is a matter of surprise that 
their numbers hold out, for they breed but slowly, produce 
but one at birth, and this but once in a year, and require 
several years to grow to maturity. Another equally 
wonderful matter, well worthy of consideration, is the 
supply of food required to sustain a large population of 
these fish-devouring animals. Take, for instance, the small 
species {Phoca mtulina) of our own shores, whose daily 
consumption in a captive state would be equal to 10 lbs. 
weight ; now it takes forty herrings to weigh 10 lbs., but 
no doubt when at liberty and full of activity the creature 
would eat a much larger quantity, therefore we may safely 
say that 1000 of these small seals would require 40,000 
herrings daily to support them. Now if we say that the 
northern seal fishery destroys 500,000 seals annually, some 
idea is given of the prodigious quantity of fishes that must 
be spared the same fate. We must therefore congratulate 
ourselves by supposing that a large portion of those fishes 
find their way to our tables instead of feeding our hairy, 
furry, and much-admired aquatic friends. The vastness of 
this inexhaustible supply is only faintly shadowed forth, 
the reality is beyond our comprehension. Imagine the 
abundance of fishes that must be consumed not only by 
the hundreds of thousands of different species of seals, 
porpoises, and other aquatic animals, but by the myriads 
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