104 
MAMMALIA. 
Morses supply diverse products of considerable importance 
in trade ; it is for this reason that sucb deadly war is waged 
against them. In the first place their tusks provide us with 
a grainy ivory, harder and whiter than that of the Elephant. 
These tusks detach themselves when the animal’s head has 
been boiled in a cauldron of water. An oil of a better quality 
than that of the Whale is extracted from their fat ; each Morse 
produces half a ton of it. Lastly, their skins, properly cured 
and tanned, become very thick and substantial leather, which is 
employed in carriage making. In the middle ages, cords and 
cables, of a solidity which was proof against everything, were 
made of this leather. Albert le Grand, in the fourteenth century, 
relates that this skin had a great commercial value in the market 
of Cologne. The Morse was unknown to antiquity. 
The Seal Family, Phociclce . — Seals have considerable analogy 
of form to the Morse ; but they have not the long tusks which 
characterize the latter. Their heads are rounded, and very much 
resemble that of a Dog ; their eyes are large, bright, and very soft. 
They can shut their nostrils when they plunge, and thus prevent 
the water from running into the back of their mouths. Their 
ears, which consist generally of but simple openings, without any 
exterior conch, are endowed with the same property. Their 
mouths are furnished, from top to bottom, with three sorts of 
teeth — incisive, canine, and molar. The molars differ little from 
those of the Carnivora ; but among these we do not find, as we do 
in other Carnivora, those molar teeth called tuberculous . Of their 
members one only sees the extremities, composed of five very long 
toes, joined together by a broad membrane. Their hind feet, 
arranged side by side, form a sort of hollow fin, the centre of 
which is occupied by a short tail. The spine is so very flexible 
that they can set up on end the anterior part of their body nearly 
vertically, the hinder portion remaining horizontal. 
The large size of their brain leads one. to conclude that they 
have a high degree of intelligence. These animals’ senses, how- 
ever, do not appear to be very much developed. According to 
the observations of Cuvier, their sense of sight is the best. Seals 
see pretty well for some distance, but too great a quantity of 
light dazzles them ; and so they have the pupil contractile, like 
