2

the cow gives birth to a single young one

Upon this "might is right" principle the rookery is soon definitely parcelled out, but as yet no cows have appeared upon the scene. Their advent is delayed three weeks or more beyond that of their lords and masters, and it is probably mid-June before the tide of immigration has in their case reached its height. Their arrival is the signal for a renewal of the fighting. As each cow" hauls up" she is at once seized and appropriated by the nearest bull, who, after depositing her within his holding, turns his attention to the securing of the next arrival. Mere annexation does not necessarily mean possession, however, and a dozen or more pitched battles may be fought over some coveted fair one, until -appropriated time after time by some third party-she eventually finds herself far from her first owner. During these struggles the cows are sometimes seized by each of the combatants, and tugged so violently in opposite directions that the skin is torn in strips from their back and limbs.

In due course of time these difficulties become adjusted, the cows have all landed, and peace once more reigns in the rookery. If the breeding-ground be now examined it is at once evident why the bulls have striven to obtain the posts adjacent to the sea. Here those that have been fortunate enough or strong enough to hold their own are now seen lording it over a harem abundant in wives, while at the back and outskirts of the ground those who are weaker or younger are but ill-provided. It is doubtful whether any more preposterous polygamist exists than the fur-seal. Mr. Elliott records an instance where one powerful old bull, scarred and gashed, and with one eye gouged out, watched jealously over no less than fortyfive wives. This, of course, is exceptional. From twelve to twenty appears to be a good average for the best places, while on the remote holdings the juniors are lucky enough if they obtain one or two. Almost immediately after her arrival

gular fact that the period of gestation should be so prolonged in a creature which is of such small size, and attains maturity so quickly, but it is certain, both from the above and other facts, that it is as nearly as possible a year in duration. The pup is born with the eyes open, and is soon active enough-two points much in its favor in the midst of the crowded rookery and the ceaseless fighting around it. The mother is by no means devoted, leaving it to shift very much for itself. As far as can be made out, it is most curiously indifferent to food, those in charge of the rookery assuring me that it often went a day or more without suckling. If it be a male, this abstinence, as will presently be seen, serves him as a useful training for his future life.

Crowded as the rookery has been from the beginning, the birth of the pups has nearly doubled its population, and the scene is busier than ever. From a tolerably early period, when the cows have all ceased" hauling up," and the fighting has stopped, and when there can no longer be any doubt as to ownership, the bulls have permitted the members of their harem to go down to the sea to swim and feed. No such relaxation, unhappily for him, is possible for the head of the family. Should he leave his little holding to satisfy the cravings of hunger, he would find his household hearth cold upon his return. So long as he sticks to his post his neighbors will respect his presence and let his wives alone, but desertion, if only for a short time, leaves his home in the position of an empty claim, which-to pursue the mining simile-may be "jumped" by the first comer. And so, from the middle of May, or at latest from the beginning of June, until mid-August-a period of soine twelve or thirteen weeks-the matrimonial responsibilities of the bull seal entail not only imprisonment within the limits of a few square feet of ground, but a fast so absolute and protracted as to put the efforts of the toughest Indian fakir to the blush. As may be imagined, this prolonged period of starvation is not without its effect upon the unhappy animal. Weak and emaciated. its body scarred with wounds, it regains the water in very different condition to that in which it first landed on the island.

In August, then, the " season, "if I may so term it, is over. The bulls have gone down to the sea, to return no more, or at least only very occasionally, till the following year. All trace of organization in the rookery is now lost. The busy life still continues, and the numbers scarcely seem diminished, but the holluschicki roam where they please without let or hindrance, and the masses have become more discreet and scattered. The pups have nearly all learned to swim- —an art which, curious to relate, appears in their case to be not natural, but acquired. Then comes autumn, a season short enough in these latitudes, and the numbers become thinned. With the first snow many take their departure, and by the end of October the majority are gone. After the 20th of November, I was told, scarcely one is to be seen, save here and there some late-born pup who has as yet not perfected himself in the art of swimming. It is a commonly received opinion among the Bering Island Aleuts that an early departure portends a severe winter, while on the other hand, if the animals remain beyond the usual time, a more open season will be experienced.

Both on land and in the water it is with the fore-limb that the seal progresses. When swimming, steering only is managed by the long hind-flippers, which bear a singularly close resemblance, both in texture and appearance, to a lady's long black-kid glove. The animals seem to take particular care of these appendages, either keeping them straight out at the side, or lifting them up in ridiculous manner when walking. The gait is awkward, making the creature appear as if partly paralyzed, a step or two being first taken with the fore-limb and the hind-quarters then approximated by an arching of the spine, the method of progression thus resembling that of a "geometer" caterpillar. Although slow, the seal can cover a good deal of ground, and is often found at some distance from the sea. He is, moreover, a very passable climber, ascending rocks and cliffs which those unaccustomed to his habits would deem quite beyond the range of his powers. All, adults and young, are very sensitive to atmospheric changes. Their ideal weather is certainly not ours. A cold, raw fog is most appreciated, and sun, warmth, and clear skies drive thein at once into the sea. There is probably not another instance

in the animal world in which the male differs so strikingly from the female as in the case of Callorhinus. Up to the age of three years they are alike in size, but after that period, while the female ceases to grow, the bull increases from year to year in size and fatness until he becomes gigantic. Thus, according to Mr. Elliott, the weight of a three-year-old male is about 90 pounds, and its length about four feet, but an old bull would weigh 600 pounds and measure seven feet. Enormous masses of fat load his chest and shoulders, and the increase in bulk renders him unwieldy and unable to get about like a holluschack. It is these old warriors, nevertheless, who get the best places in the rookery, where weight rather than agility wins the day. Taking the average weight of a female as 90 or 100 pounds, their consorts when arrived at full growth may be said to be just six times their size!

When the seal has reached its sixth year the fur it yields is much deteriorated in quality. Still older, it is practically worthless. The skin of the pup, on the other hand, not having reached its full size, has also not reached its full value. It is evident, then, since the slaughter of the cows would be manifestly an unwise proceeding, that the males between the ages of two and five years should alone be killed, if it be desired to keep the rookeries undiminished in numbers and to obtain the best commercial results. This system, with still further limitations, is that adopted. The holluschack has unconsciously lent himself to its furtherance. The playgrounds, being distinct and separate, not only permit of his being driven off comfortably to the slaughter without any difficulties of separation from others of different sex or age, but also obviate the necessity of disturbing the breeding-grounds, which are seldom penetrated even by the officials. When therefore a "drive" is resolved on, two or three natives run in between the holluschicki and the sea and herd them landward, an operation which with these slow-moving animals is easily effected. As many as it is desired to kill are then separated, and the march to the place of execution commences. It is fittingly funereal in pace, for, if over-driven, the animals not only die on the road, but the quality of the fur in the survivors is spoiled. Even at the rate of half a mile

an hour many are compelled to fall out of the ranks. No difficulty is experienced, and with a man or two on either flank and in rear, the seals are herded with far less trouble than a flock of sheep. In some instances the killing-grounds are at a considerable distance from the rookery, in others they are quite near. Strange to Strange to say, the proximity of thousands of putrefying carcases of their kind does not seem in any way to affect the survivors.

Arrived on the ground, the animals are left awhile to rest and get cool, and are then separated out in small batches to be killed. A staff between five and six feet in length, with a knob at the end, weighted with lead, is used in the operation. The animal is struck on the head, and a knife thrust into the chest penetrates the heart or great vessels, and causes rapid death. Upon the subject of cruelty in the slaughter and skinning of the fur-seals much unnecessary ink has recently been shed. Whatever exists is neither more nor less than is perpetrated by English butchers in the course of their daily avocations. The skin is removed at once, and the carcase left to rot where it lies. In this way enormous quantities of valuable oil are wasted. The animals killed are, without exception, males at the beginning of the third and fourth years.

The after-history of the skins it is not within the province of this paper to relate, for a description of the method of curing would alone fill many pages. It is enough to say that they leave the islands roughly salted and tied together in bundles, the Company's steamer calling twice yearly. The interest at present is centred in the living animal and not in the product-in the goose and not the golden eggs; and the life-history, as we have just studied it, of the animal now so largely attracting the world's attention is of no little importance in the question whether Bering's Sea shall or shall not be open to British and other foreign vessels. That sealing, as carried on by the poaching schooners, is a very paying trade there is no doubt whatever. Year by year the number of vessels thus engaged increases. It is not easy to obtain information, but probably not less than thirty fit out on the American seaboard, and about the same number on the Asiatic side. We know that over fortythousand sealskins were landed on the American continent in 1890, and we can

not estimate the "take" of the craft from Japan and China as much less than thirty thousand. This is almost equal to half the combined yield of the Komandorskis and the Prybilovs. At this rate the fur-seal will at no very remote period in the future become as extinct as his former comrade the Rhytina. It cannot be denied that international interests, totally apart from any political question, demand that this danger shall be averted.

It has been stated, by those who hold a brief for the "illicit" schooners, that the seals breed at various places on the North American coast and its islands—a statement which, if true, would of course materially alter the aspect of the case. But though doubtless a good number of the animals stop to rest there and “haulup," or a few even, from rarely-occurring causes, to give birth to a young one, these localities cannot for a moment, I think, be put forward as the real source of the schooners' cargoes. Zoology teaches us that the fur-seal is a gregarious animal, and it is in the immediate neighborhood of the vast breeding-grounds I have just described that the bulk of the skins is obtained. Although perhaps actual landing on a rookery is not so much practised as formerly, the dense sea-fogs render the three-mile limit a dead-letter. As a poacher's rabbit is one as I just found dead in the hedge, sir," so the greater number of sealskins in a schooner's hold will be found on inquiry-of the captain-to have been killed on the broad bosom of the Pacific.

The question, as I have said, is one involving general interests, and does not merely affect the Company renting the islands, and the Government which obtains its £60,000 or £70,000 therefrom. The system of slaughter at present in vogue must be put a stop to. But a mare clausum is to England as a red rag; she will have none of it. Nor, indeed, can it be said that it would set the matter at rest; for it would not entirely do away with illicit sealing. One alternative at least remains-the establishment of a close time, to be recognized internationally, and enforced by cruisers of the various nations concerned in the preservation of this valuable animal. In the spring-migration northward, every adult female seal is heavy with young. From June till August the breeding season is at its height, while from the latter month till the end of October

the fur is in bad condition and of little value. Most of the animals taken by the schooners are shot or harpooned while swimming or lying asleep on the surface of the water, when it is impossible with certainty to ascertain the sex. Given these facts, the inference is obvious. A close season should be established from April until the end of October, during which time it should under no circumstances be permissible to kill seals except upon the rookeries. The animals would still remain feræ naturæ, and their capture during the

southern migration would be legal. But under these circumstances it is highly improbable that the illicit sealers would find the trade sufficiently remunerative to be undertaken. Of the slaughter of cows in young, males with useless pelts, and undersized pups we have had enough. By this means the question would be shifted froin political to zoological grounds, and the recently-established and totally unjustifiable trade of the seal-poacher would be effectually, but legitimately ended.-Murray's Magazine.

WHEN St. Bruno, the founder of the Carthusian Order, went in search of a retreat, he could not have found a spot more suitable for a life of solitude and contemplation than the desert of the Chartreuse, in the mountains of Dauphiné. Tradition says that the place was marked out for him by a revelation. German by birth, St. Bruno belongs to France by his education and subsequent career. He was born of a noble family, at Cologne, in 1035, and was partly educated there; but he continued his studies at the school of Rheims, which was then celebrated, and distinguished himself so much that he was made Director of all the public schools in that town and Chancellor of the diocese.

He fought hard against the abuses in the Church during the tenure of the corrupt Archbishop Manassès the First, who deprived him, in consequence, of his post and his worldly goods, and drove him into exile. But the cause of justice triumphed in the end the Archbishop was deposed for simony, and St. Bruno was thought of as his successor. Meanwhile he had determined to leave the world and enter the monastic life, and nothing could turn him from this resolution.

Learned, pious, large-hearted (" homo profundi cordis," says a contemporary), with a mature judgment, a complete mastery over himself, a serene and equable spirit, he was well fitted to become a leader of men; but he only learned by degrees what he was destined for. He began by going to the Benedictine morastery of Molesme, and lived in it for some time as

a monk. Not finding there, however, the solitude he wished for, he went to Grenoble to consult with the young bishop; Hugues de Chateauneuf, who had once been his pupil at Rheims. At the moment Bruno and his six followers entered the town, in June 1084, Hugo dreamed that he saw seven stars fall at his feet, rise again to pursue their course through the mountains, till they stopped at a place called Chartrousse, or Chartreuse. Here angels built a house, and on the roof appeared the seven stars. The bishop was puzzled by the dream; but when he saw the seven travellers appear, and ask for his advice, he understood its meaning, and joyfully guided them himself through the mountains to the spot which God had shown him.

A chapel was erected; and in a short time arose the first monastery, built of wood, consisting of a large cloister, with cells opening out into it, a refectory, chapter-room, and a hostelry for strangers. Each cell was divided into a study and kitchen, a bedroom with oratory, and a workroom. This served as a model for all future monasteries of the Order. The bishop insured his friends the undisturbed possession of the Valley of the Chartreuse by giving up all his rights to it, and inducing others to do the same.

St. Bruno himself did not enjoy his retreat long. In 1090 he was called to Italy by Pope Urban the Second, his former pupil at Rheims. He reluctantly obeyed the summons. At the loss of the shepherd the sheep dispersed, but they came

back to their retreat within the year. Bruno himself never saw his beloved Chartreuse again he died in a monastery which he had founded in Calabria.

Not fifty years after its foundation the first Chartreuse was destroyed by a terrible avalanche. The two chapels erected by St. Bruno were spared, and on their old foundations stand Notre Dame de Casalibus and the chapel of St. Bruno. When this calamity happened the question arose whether it would not be wiser to rebuild the monastery on a spot which was not exposed to such destruction, and Guigues, the head of the Order at that time, resolved to build it in the place where it now stands, and to leave the two chapels on the old site, as places of pilgrimage. But other calamities were reserved for the new monastery. No less than eight fires at different times reduced it to ashes; and, except one part of the cloister and the clock tower (which date from the fourteenth century), the church (which has been frequently restored), the mortuary-chapel, and the Chapelle St. Louis, little remains of the building that is older than the end of the seventeenth century, when the last fire took place, and when it was finally rebuilt.

Two beautiful carriage-roads lead from Grenoble to the Grand Chartreuse. The one by St. Laurent du Pont is usually taken to go there; the other, by the Sappey, for the return. The road from St. Laurent du Pont to the Chartreuse was made in 1854-56. Before that time there existed only a path for pedestrians and mules, which the monks themselves had made in the fifteenth century. From the village of St. Laurent du Pont, called in the old days St. Laurent du Désert, the road ascends through a magnificent gorge, and the Chartreuse is reached in about two hours. A little beyond St. Laurent is Fourvoirie, where the monks, since the fourteenth century, have had stables and warehouses, and where they now distil their liqueur. Here a fort, La Jarjatte, made in 1715, defended the entrance to the desert, but it was demolished in 1856. The road first follows for some time the left bank of the Guiers-Mort, then crosses the Pont St. Bruno, and passes along the right bank. Gigantic rocks, partly covered with a luxurious vegetation, tower above it, while the torrent rushes and foams in the chasm below, which grows

deeper as the road ascends, till at last the eye plunges with a shudder into the wooded precipice. A huge pointed rock--le pic de l'Aiguille-surmounted with cross, rises between the road and the stream. Here also once existed a fort, l'Eillette, constructed by the monks in the fifteenth century to defend the road they had just made; but it was also demolished in 1856.

An occasional traveller, a cart loaded with timber from the mountains, alone disturb this grand solitude. Leaving the stream, the road continues through the forest, and finally reaches an open space, where the buildings of the Chartreuse appear in sight, at the foot of a range of mountains, the highest of which is the Grand Som.

Those who look for the picturesque in architecture, or for treasures of art, need not go to the Grande Chartreuse-let them turn to the Certosa of Pavia. But the historical associations of eight centuries cast their own halo round the spot. From this parent institution the Carthusian convents over the whole world have been governed, for the prior of the Grande Chartreuse is the père général—the head of the whole Order.

On arrival, the gentlemen walk to the monastery, where they are received by one of the brothers and shown to their cells. These are in a building across the courtyard, and were formerly destined for the priors who came from the provinces to attend the general chapter; and the strangers have their meals in the refectories which were used by the same priors. The ladies go to a house a few steps to the left, which was once the infirmary, and are welcomed by a nun from the Convent of the Sœurs de la Providence, near Grenoble, who, with three lay sisters, spends the summer there to receive the female visitors. The small guests' rooms are much the same in both establishments, and are furnished, in the simplest fashion, with a bed, chair, wash-hand stand, prie-dieu, crucifix, and one or two religious prints. The ladies have, however, the advantage of being able to replenish the scanty watersupply at the fountain before the Infirmary, which, in the freshness of the early morning, in the midst of such surroundings, is peculiarly exhilarating.

It was a beautiful October evening when we arrived at the Grande Chartreuse. The