When the hunter at last reaches the point at which he considers it safe to risk a shot, you hear the report of his gun and see him immediately spring to his feet and rush for his prey. If his bullet strikes the head or neck of the animal it rarely gets away, though sometimes even then it slips out of reach, so close do they keep to their holes. If it is hit anywhere else it almost invariably escapes the hunter, though it may not escape death. Often the hunter reaches the hole in time to seize his prey by the hind flipper just as it is passing down into the water. I remember standing and gazing mournfully down into a hole one day through which a seal that I had shot had just escaped, though his blood tinged the water and edges of the ice, and while I was lamenting my ill-luck I heard a splash behind me and turned in time to see the seal come up through another hole. He looked awfully sick, and didn't see me until I had him by the flipper, sprawling on his back, at a safe distance from the hole. This was quite good luck for me, for such an opportunity rarely occurs, though I have occasionally known Toolooah to recover a lost one in the same way. When struck with a spear they seldom escape, for the line is fastened to the side of the spear-head, which detaches itself from the staff and holds in the flesh like a harpoon. Sometimes, however, the seal will slip away after the spear is thrown, and, instead of striking him, it strikes the ice where he had been lying. This is very aggravating after the cold and tedious labor of working up upon it has been accomplished; but the Esquimau bears his misfortune with equanimity. It is seldom that he says more than "ma-muk'-poo now" (no good), or "mar-me an'-ner" (which means "angry," or is an expression used when one is angry). He gathers up his weapons, sits down and lights his pipe, and after a recuperative smoke moves on in search of another opportunity to go through the same process. Sometimes he is fortunate enough to find a seal absolutely asleep upon the ice, and then he can walk right up alongside of him and put the rifle barrel to his ear before firing. In some parts of the Arctic, as at Iwillik (Repulse Bay), there is a species called "wandering seal," which in the spring are known to come upon the ice in great numbers, usually through a huge crack, and move quite a distance from the open water. This affords the natives a grand opportunity, and the entire village--men, women and children--repair to the spot, and by getting between the seals and the water, cut off their escape, so that they fall an easy prey to the clubs with which they are slaughtered by the men. In this way they sometimes kill as many as seventy-five or a hundred in a single day. But the haunts of the "wandering seal" are not found everywhere; they are favored localities. It is generally pretty hard work to kill a seal.