them facially very much resemble a bull terrier.
The adults are called bulls and cows, while, curiously enough, in the
sealers' phrase, the offspring are referred to as pups. The places where
large numbers of them gather together during the breeding season are
known as rookeries! "Rookery" appears to me to be inapplicable to a
herd of sea elephants, though "pup" supplies a more apt description of
the young.

The pups, born during September or early October, are covered with a
long, black, wavy fur, which they lose when about two months old, and in
its place comes a growth of silver-grey hair, which changes later into
the ordinary brown colour of the full-grown animal.

The old males and females leave the island about the end of January, and
are not seen again (except a few stray ones) till August in the case of
the males, and until September in the case of the females.

The fact that the bulls arrive first leads one to the conclusion that
their feeding-grounds must lie at a considerable distance and, in the
journey therefrom, the males, being the stronger, should arrive before
the females, who are heavy with young and probably make a somewhat
leisurely progress, feeding by the way.

The rookeries vary in size, containing from half a dozen to four or
five hundred cows; in the last case, of course, being an aggregation
of smaller rookeries, each with its proprietor, in the shape of an old
bull, lying in or somewhere near the centre. The normal rookery, as far
as I could judge, seemed to be one that contained about forty cows, but
once the nucleus was formed, it was hard to say how many cows would be
there before the season ended, as females keep arriving for a period of
about three weeks.

The young vary in length from three and a half to four and a half feet,
are born within a few days of arrival and suckled for about a month,
becoming enormously fat. The cow, who has not eaten during the whole of
this time and has become very thin, then leaves the pup, but remains
in the rookery for about two days, after which she escapes to sea,
remaining there till the beginning of January, when she returns to
the island to moult. The pups when weaned get such rough usage in the
rookery that they soon make off into the tussock and sleep for about a
month, living on their fat and acquiring a new coat. The noise in one of
the large rookeries is something to remember--the barking of the pups,
the whimpering and yelping of the mothe