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Show 1869.] DR. J. MURIE ON THE SEALS OF THE FALKLANDS. 107 the entrance of the freshwater rivulets into the sea. At such times they will remain a whole tide dabbling about singly after food. This consists of fish and crustaceans. In capturing their prey they swallow it either above or below the water. Our live Sea-lion in the Gardens, as a rule, comes to the surface during the process of deglutition ; the other Seals swallow underneath the water. Lecomte says the Eared Seals never drink water ; and he substantiates the fact that he kept the first animal he brought to this country for a year without fluid, except such as adhered to the fish he fed it with. He tells me, moreover, he has noticed the common Seals in our own collection occasionally suck in water as a horse would, but the Otaria never. Another curious circumstance he assures me of is, that in the stomach of every one he has examined, with the single exception of a young animal, there existed a quantity of pebbles. The amount varied in individuals from a few to many. Indeed one of the Falkland- Island pilots told Lecomte in good faith that he himself had removed 28 lb. of stones from the digestive cavity of an Elephant- Seal, an old Otaria jubata (?). The common notion among the traders and hunters is that these Seals swallow the stones as a kind of ballast to enable them to dive quickly after their prey. For my own part I cannot at all accept this reason on the evidence. The voices of the old and young animals differ in tone. The adult, and more particularly the old ones either growl in an undertone, or, when excited during the breeding-season, heighten this to a voluminous interrupted roar. The young cries with a kind of bleat like a sheep. In the first Sea-lion possessed by the Society the pupils of the eyes contracted and dilated to an enormous extent; and when enlarged, which took place towards sunset, they became of an opaline hue. The live Otaria jubata at present in the Gardens also manifests considerable dilatability of the pupils, but not quite the same change of colour. At night the eye of Phoca vitulina appears iridescent, as in some Carnivora. As regards this frequent change in the diameter of the pupil in Otaria, this may have relation to its nocturnal habits as much as to the difference of medium in which the animal lives. The sexual season lasts for about a month, namely, between the latter end of February and that of March. As has been described by other observers, Lecomte remarks there are then regular pitched battles, the females looking on but not interfering. The males at such times are savage, and if attacked do not run away ; but the females are rather timid and shy. After these matches are adjusted, a good deal of playing and gambolling in the water occurs, but the act of coupling takes place on the land. When a male, through age or otherwise, is driven away, he leads a solitary life, and then often goes further inland. The females go with young about ten months, giving birth to a single one about Christmas or the end of the year, equivalent to our midsummer in this country. Lecomte says there is no great interval between parturition in the females of a herd, as the young range much of a size. They rear their offspring at a short distance from |
