were rowing
slowly, and the sail had been lowered and furled while he was asleep.
Every few minutes a shout could be heard in the distance, which was
answered by one of the sailors in the whale-boat.

"Where's the mate's boat, Hank?" asked the boy, realizing he had heard
only one shout.

"She got out of hailin' distance, a little while before breakfast," the
other answered, "but that doesn't matter so much, because she can't very
well get lost now."

"But why is the sail down?"

The old whaler held up his hand.

"Do you hear that noise?" he asked.

"Of course I hear it," the boy answered; "that's what woke me up. But
what is it?" he continued, as the roar swelled upon the wind.

"What does it sound like?" the gunner asked him.

The boy listened carefully for a minute or two and then shook his head.

"Hard to say," he answered. "It sounds like a cross between Niagara and
a circus."

Scotty, who had overheard this, looked round.

"That's not bad," he said; "that's just about what it does sound like."

"But what is the cause of it, Hank?" the boy queried again. "I never
heard such a row!"

"Fur seals!" was the brief reply.

"Seals?" said Colin, jumping up eagerly. "Oh, where?"

"Sit down, boy," interrupted the captain sternly; "you'll see enough of
seals before you get home."

"All right, Captain Murchison," Colin answered; "I'm in no hurry to be
home."

In spite of his recent loss the captain could not help a grim smile
stealing over his face at the boy's readiness for adventure, no matter
where it might lead. But he had been a rover in his boyhood himself, and
so he said no more.

"Why, there must be millions of seals to make as much noise as that!"
Colin objected.

"There aren't; at least, not now," was Hank's reply. "There were tens of
millions of fur seals in these waters when I made my first trip out here
in 1860, but they've been killed off right an' left, same as the
buffalo. The government has to protect 'em now, an' there's no pelagic
sealin' allowed at all."

"What's pelagic sealing?" asked Colin.

"Killing seals at sea," the whaler answered. "That's wrong, because you
can't always tell a young male from a female seal in the water, an' the
females ought never to be killed. But you'll learn all about it. Beg
pardon, sir," Hank continued, speaking to the captain, "but by the noise
of the seals those must be either the Pribilof or the Commander
Islands?"

"Pribilof, by my reckoning,"