Part 4

By the _walrus_ we understand those animals commonly called _sea-cows_, or _sea-horses_. We know of two species of this animal, one found only in the northern seas, and the other only in the southern, which is called _dugan_ or _Indian walrus_. And lastly, under that of _manati_, we comprehend those called _lamantans_, or _sea-oxen_, in St. Domingo, and other parts of South America, as well as that of Senegal, and other parts of the coast of Africa, and which seem to be only varieties of the American species.

The seal and the walrus approach nearer to quadrupeds than to cetaceous animals, because they have a kind of feet. But the manatis, which have only two before, are more of the cetaceous tribes than the quadrupeds. But they differ from every other animal by the following striking character. They are the only animals that can equally live in air and water, and consequently the only ones we can properly term _amphibious_. In man, and the other terrestrial viviparous animals, the _foramen ovale_ of the heart, which permits the foetus to live without respiration, is shut at the moment of its birth, and remains closed during life. In these, on the contrary, it is always open, notwithstanding the females bring forth their young on land; and their respiration begins and operates immediately after birth, as it does in every other animal. By means of this perpetual aperture in the septum, subsisting and permiting the communication of the blood from the _vena cava_ to the _aorta_, these animals have the advantage of breathing or not at pleasure. This singular property is common to all three; but each has peculiar faculties, which we shall notice as far as possible, in the history of the different species.

_Engraved for Barr's Buffon._

THE SEAL.

The Seal (_fig. 192._) in general has a round head, like the human species; a broad muzzle like the otter; eyes large and elevated; little or no external ears, having only two auditory passages on the sides of the head; whiskers about its mouth; teeth somewhat resembling those of the wolf; the tongue forked at the point; the body, hands, and feet, covered with a short and bristly hair; no arms but two membranes, like hands, with five fingers terminated by as many claws; no legs but two feet exactly like the hands, except being larger and turned backwards, as if designed to unite with a very short tail, which they accompany on each side; the body is thickest at the breast from whence it tapers down to the tail like a fish. He is so strange an animal that he appears fictitious, and has served as a model for the poets to form their tritons, syrens, and other sea deities, whom they feigned to have the head of a man, the body of a quadruped, and the tail of a fish. In fact, he seems to reign superior in the mute empire of the sea, by his voice, figure, and intelligence, which he possesses equally with any land animal; he is so far above the order of fishes, that he seems not only to belong to a different order of beings, but to a different world. Hence though of a nature very distant from that of our domestic animals, yet he seems susceptible of a kind of education. He is reared by putting him often in water; he is taught to give a salute with his head and his voice; he will come when called, and he gives many other signs of intelligence and docility.

His brain is proportionally larger than in man: his sensations are as perfect, and his intellects as active, as those of any quadruped; both are strongly marked in his docility, his social qualities, his strong instinct for the female, his great attention towards his young, and by the expressive modulation of his voice, which is superior to that of any other animal. His body is likewise firm and large; he is very strong and armed with sharp teeth and claws. He also enjoys many particular and singular advantages. He can, with perfect ease, endure heat or cold; he feeds indifferently on grass, flesh, or fish; and he can equally live on ice, land, or in the wafer. This animal, with the walrus alone, deserves the name of _amphibious_. They alone have the _foramen ovale_ open, consequently they are the only animals who can exist without respiration, the elements of air and water being equally agreeable. The otter and the beaver cannot properly be termed amphibious, as the air is their real element, for not having this aperture through the septum of the heart, they cannot remain any length of time under the water, but are obliged to quit it, or raise their heads out of it in order to respire.

But these great advantages are counter-balanced by imperfections still greater. The seal may be said to be deprived of the use of his limbs, as his arms, thighs, and legs are almost entirely shut up within his body, while nothing appears without but his hands and feet, which are, it is true, furnished with five fingers or toes, but which are scarcely moveable, being united by a strong membrane, so that they might more properly be called fins than hands and feet, being more adapted for the purpose of swimming than walking. Besides the hind feet are turned backwards, therefore entirely useless upon land, so that when the animal is obliged to move, he drags himself forward like a reptile, and with efforts much more painful, for as he cannot bend himself in an arch, like the serpent, to obtain the support of different parts, and so advance by the reaction of the ground, he would remain like a lump on the earth if it were not for his hands and tail, and with which he seizes any thing within his reach with such dexterity that he drags himself up the steepest shores, rocks, and even shoals of ice, however steep or slippery. By this method he moves with a much greater degree of swiftness than could be expected, and often, though wounded, escapes the pursuit of the hunters.

The seal is a social animal, at least great numbers generally frequent the same places. Their natural climate is the north, but they live in the temperate and even hot countries, for they are seen on the shores of almost all the seas of Europe and even in the Mediterranean; they are found also in the southern seas of Africa and America; but they are infinitely more common and more numerous in the northern seas of Asia, Europe, and America. This species varies in size, colour, and figure, according to the difference of climates. We have seen some of these animals alive, and many of their skins have been sent to us; out of these we have chosen two for our present subject; the first is the common seal of our European sea, of which there are many varieties. We have seen one, the proportions of whose body seemed to differ from any other, its neck being shorter, its body longer, and its claws larger; but these differences are not sufficient to constitute a distinct species. The second is the seal of the Mediterranean and southern seas, which we presume to be the _phoca_ of the ancients, and a distinct species, for it differs from the others in the quality and colour of the hair, which is flowing, and almost black, whereas that of the common kind is grey, and of a bristly nature. Its teeth and ears are also different, for it has a very small external ear, which the other has not; its incisive teeth are likewise terminated with two points, while the teeth of the other are smooth and sharp, like those of the dog, wolf, and other quadrupeds. Its arms, or fins, are also situated lower, that is to say, more backward. Nevertheless, these discrepancies are, perhaps, only varieties depending on the climate, and not specific differences; especially as in places where the seals abound, there are numbers of them found larger and smaller, thicker and thinner, and of different colours according to their sex and age.

From a similarity, which appeared at first sight but trivial, and by some fugitive accounts, we were induced to suppose this second seal, or small seal, was the _phoca_ of the ancients. We were informed that the one we had was brought from India, and very probably it came from the Levant. It was an adult, as it had all its teeth. It was about a fifth less than the full-grown seals of our ocean, and about two-thirds less than those of the Frozen Sea, for it was not above two feet five inches in length, while that described by Mr. Parsons was seven feet and a half long, though not arrived at its full growth, as it wanted several teeth. Now the characters given by the ancients of their phoca do not denote so large an animal, but agree with the small seal, which they often compare to the otter and beaver.

There is another circumstance mentioned by the ancients as belonging to the phoca, which, though false, could never have been intimated as belonging to our seals, or those of the northern seas. They say that the phoca's hair waves like the sea, and by a natural sympathy follows its motions, lying backward when it flows and forward when it ebbs, and that this remarkable effect remains long after the skin is separated from the animal. Now this could never be attributed to our seals, nor to those of the northern seas, since the hair of both is short and stiff; while, on the contrary, it rather agrees with that of the small seal, which is longer, and of a more supple nature than the hair of the common kind. Besides, Cardan positively asserts, that this property, which had been regarded as fabulous, is found to be a fact in India. Without placing more dependance on this assertion of Cardan's than it deserves, we must allow it indicates that this circumstance belongs to the Indian seal, though possibly it is nothing more than an electric phenomenon, the effects of which the ancients being ignorant might ascribe it to the flowing and ebbing of the sea. However this may be, the above reasons are a sufficient foundation to presume, that the small seal is the phoca of the ancients; and there is also great reason to conclude, that it is the same as that M. Rondelatius calls the _Mediterranean phoca_, the body of which, according to him, is much longer and smaller, in proportion, than our seal. The great seal, described by Mr. Parsons, and which, probably, came from the northern seas, seems to be a different species from the other two, for, notwithstanding it had scarcely any teeth, it was as big again, in all its dimensions, as the common kind. Mr. Parsons, as Mr. Klein judiciously remarks, speaks a great deal on the subject of this animal in a few words, and has given the following observations in the Philosophical Transactions, No. 469, p. 383, 386.

"A sea-calf was shewn at Charing-cross, London, in the month of February, 1742-3. The figures given by Aldrovandus, Johnston, and others, being designed in profile, lead us into two errors. 1st. They make the legs apparent, though they are not visible externally in any position the animal is placed; and, secondly, the hind feet are represented like two fins, whereas they are two real feet, webbed like those of a water-fowl, each having five toes, composed of three articulations, and ending with darkish-coloured claws. The claws on the fore-feet are very large and broad, nearly like those of a mole, and seem to be designed for the purposes of crawling, and partly for swimming, as between each toe there is a narrow membrane; but the membranes of the hind feet are much larger, and only serve to row the animal along when in the water. It was a female, and died in the morning of the 16th of February, 1742-3. The hairs that were about its mouth were of a horny and transparent substance; its stomach, intestines, bladder, kidneys, ureters, diaphragm, lungs, great blood-vessels, and the parts of generation, were like those of a cow: the spleen was two feet long, four inches broad, and exceedingly thin; the liver was composed of six lobes, each of which was long and thin, like the spleen; the gall bladder was very small; the heart long, and of a soft texture, having a large foramen ovale, and the fleshy parts very considerable. In the lower stomach were about four pounds weight of sharp and angular pieces of flint, which seems as if the animal had swallowed them for the purpose of grinding its food. This animal is viviparous, and suckles its young by the mamilla, like quadrupeds, and its flesh is firm and muscular. Although it had attained seven feet and a half in length, yet it was but young, as it had scarcely any teeth; and it had four small holes regularly placed about the navel, which were the preceding signs of four teats to appear hereafter."

Thus it appears there are three kinds of seals, differing from each other. The small black seal of India and the Levant; the common seal of our seas; and the great seal of the northern ocean. To the first of these, therefore, we must refer all that the ancients have written about the _phoca_. Aristotle was acquainted with this animal, for he has described it of an ambiguous nature, an intermediate creature between aquatic and terrestrial animals; that is, an imperfect quadruped, having no external teats for suckling its young, and only very apparent auditory passages; that its tongue is forked, and has a small tail resembling that of a stag. This entirely agrees with the seal; but he is deceived in affirming that its has no gall-bladder. Mr. Parsons, indeed says, that the gall-bladder of the great seal which he describes, was very small; but M. Daubenton found a gall-bladder in the seal which he dissected proportionable to the size of the liver; and the gentlemen of the Academy of Sciences, who also met with a gall-bladder in the seal which they dissected do not speak of its being remarkably small.

Aristotle could not have had any knowledge of the great seal of the Frozen Sea, since in the time he lived all the north of Europe and of Asia was unknown, The Romans considered Gaul and Germany as their north, and the Greeks knew still less of the animals belonging to this part of the world; it is, therefore, very probable, that when Aristotle speaks of the _phoca_ as a very common animal, he only means the Mediterranean seal.

These three species have many properties in common with each other; the females bring forth in winter, and place their young upon some sand-bank, rock, or small island. When they suckle their young they sit upon their hind legs, and continue to nourish them in this manner for twelve or fifteen days, after which she brings them to the water, accustoms them to swim, and to search for their food; she carries them on her back when they are fatigued. As each litter does not consist of above two or three, her cares are not much divided, and the education of her little ones is soon completed. In fact, these animals are very sagacious and docile; they understand and naturally assist each other in dangers. The young ones distinguish their mother among a numerous troop; and are perfectly obedient to her call. We are unacquainted with their time of gestation; but if we judge of it from that of their growth, the length of their lives, and the size of the animal, it must be many months; the time from their birth till they attain their full growth being many years, the length of their lives must be proportionably long. I am even inclined to believe that these animals live upwards of a hundred years, for we know that cetaceous animals, in general, live much longer than quadrupeds; and as the seal is the link between both it, ought to participate of the nature of the first, and consequently live much longer than the last.

The voice of the seal may be compared to the barking of an angry dog. When young, they have a shrill note, somewhat like the mewing of a cat. Those that are taken early from their dams mew continually, and often die of hunger sooner than take the food that is offered them. They bark at and endeavour to bite those who injure them, and are more of a courageous than timid nature. Instead of being terrified at thunder and lightning, it seems to delight them; they generally come on shore in tempests and storms, and even quit their icy abodes to avoid the shock of the waves; at such times they sport in great numbers along the shore: the tremendous conflict seems to divert, and the heavy rains that fall, to enliven them. They have naturally a disagreeable scent, and which is smelt at a great distance, when there are great numbers together. When pursued they often drop their excrements, which are of a yellow colour, and of a very abominable scent. They have a prodigious quantity of blood, and being also loaded with fat, they are, consequently, very dull and heavy. They usually sleep a great deal, and very sound, and are fond of taking their repose in the sun on flakes of ice, or sides of rocks, and they may be approached very nigh without being disturbed, which is the usual method of taking them. They are very seldom secured with fire-arms, for they do not immediately die, even if shot in the head, but plunge into the sea, and are entirely lost to the hunter; therefore the general method is to surprise them when asleep, or at a distance from the sea, and knock them on the head with clubs. "They are not easily killed, and are a long time dying (says an eye-witness), for although mortally wounded, their blood nearly exhausted, and even stripped of their skins, yet they still continue alive; and indeed it is a shocking sight to see them in this condition wallowing and rolling about in their blood. These remarks were made on an animal we killed, about eight feet long; after it was skinned, and deprived of the greater part of its fat, yet it attempted to bite, notwithstanding they had given him many powerful blows over the head and nose. It even seized a cutlass with as much vigour as if it had not been wounded; after which we pierced it through the heart and liver, from whence as much blood flowed as is contained in a young ox[F]."

[Footnote F: Recueil des Voyages du Nord. tom. ii. p. 117, &c.]

The hunting, or perhaps, to speak more properly, the fishing of these animals is not very difficult, and is attended with great profit, the flesh being good food, and the skin exceedingly serviceable. The Americans fill them with air, and make a kind of raft, or small boats of them: their fat yields a clear and much sweeter oil than that drawn from the porpoise, or other cetaceous animals.

To these three kinds of seals already mentioned we may, perhaps, add a fourth, described in Anson's voyages by the name of the _sea-lion_. These are found in great numbers on the Magellanic coasts, and at the island of Juan Fernandes, in the South Sea. The sea-lion resembles our seal, which is very common in the same latitudes, but it is much larger, being from eleven to eighteen feet long, and from eight to eleven in circumference, when it has acquired its full growth. They are so fat that when the skin is taken off, the blubber is about a foot thick all round the body, and from a single animal more than ninety gallons of oil may be drawn. They are, at the same time, very full of blood, and which, when deeply wounded, springs out with amazing force. Upon the throat of one of these animals being cut, two hogsheads of blood were taken out, besides what then remained in its body. Their skins are covered with a short hair of a brownish colour, but blackish on the tail and feet. Their toes are united by a membrane, which does not reach to their extremity, and each of them are terminated by a claw. The sea-lion differs from the common seal not only in its size and bulk, but also by other characters. The male has a kind of thick crest, or trunk, hanging from the end of its upper jaw, about five or six inches long. This character is not seen in the females, and forms a very striking distinction between them. The strong males collect together a flock of females, and permit no other male to approach them. These animals are truly amphibious; they remain all the summer in the sea, and go upon land in the winter; at which season the females bring forth, but never produce above one or two at a litter, which they suckle.

The sea-lions, while they are on land, feed on the herbage which grows by the sides of the sea. They are of a very heavy and drowsy nature, and delight to sleep in the mire. Though very indolent and difficult to waken, yet at those times they commonly fix some as centinels near the place where they sleep; and it is said, that these centinels give loud warnings when any danger is near. Their voices are very loud and of various tones; sometimes grunting like hogs, and sometimes neighing like horses. The males often fight about the females and wound one another desperately with their teeth. The flesh of these animals is not disagreeable to eat; particularly the tongue, which is as good as that of the ox. They are very easily killed, as they cannot defend themselves, nor fly from their enemies: they are so exceedingly heavy, that they move with great difficulty, and turn themselves with still greater. Those that hunt them have only to guard against coming too near their teeth, which are very strong, and with which they inflict deadly wounds.

By comparing other observations and accounts, and from the conclusions which may be drawn from them, the sea-lion of South America, appears to be nearly the same animal as that found on the northern coasts of the same continent. The large seal of Canada, spoken of by Denis, by the name of the sea-wolf, and which he distinguishes from the common seals, may possibly be of the same species as these sea-lions. "Their young, says this author, are bigger and longer at their birth than our largest hogs." Now it is certain that our seals are never of that size, even when full-grown. The Mediterranean seal, or the _phoca_ of the ancients, is still less; therefore there only remains the seal Mr. Parsons has described, which agrees with that mentioned by Denis. Mr. Parsons does not say whence this great seal was brought: but whether it came from the north of Europe, or from America, it might be the same as the sea-wolf of Denis, or the sea-lion of Anson, for it appears to be of the same size, since though not nearly full-grown it measured seven feet in length. Besides the size, there is the most apparent difference between the sea-lion and the seal, namely, the male of the first has a large crest on its upper jaw. Now Mr. Parsons did not see the male; he only described the female, which had no crest, and which perfectly resembled the female sea-lion, mentioned by Anson. To these similarities Parsons adds another still more precise; he says, that the great seal which he saw had a stomach and intestines like those of a cow; and the sea-lion also mentioned in Anson's Voyages, is described as an animal which feeds on grass during the whole summer. Hence it is very probable that these two animals are formed alike, or rather they are the same animals, and very different from other seals, who have but one stomach, and which live entirely upon fish.