The _Otarias_, or seals furnished with an external ear, and whose longer and more developed feet allow them to move more freely on land, rank in point of organisation at the head of the whole tribe. The most important and valuable of all is the Sea-Bear (_Arctocephalus ursinus_), of which there are probably two species; the one inhabiting the Antarctic seas, while the other roams about the coasts and islands of the Northern Pacific, and selects St. Paul, one of the Pribilow group in Behring's Sea, as its favourite summer haunt. The fine-haired, black, curly skin of the younger animals, of from four months to one year old, is particularly esteemed, so as to be classed among the finer furs which find a ready sale in the Chinese market, and serve to decorate the persons of the higher rank of mandarins. The chase, which on the latter island was formerly a promiscuous massacre, is now reduced to the slaughter of a limited number of victims. It begins in the latter part of September, on a cold foggy day when the wind blows from the side where the animals are assembled on the rocky shore. The boldest huntsmen, accustomed to clamber over stones and cliffs, open the way; then follow their less experienced comrades, and the chief personage of the band comes last, to be the better able to direct and survey the movements of his men, who are all armed with clubs. The main object is to cut off the herd as quickly as possible from the sea. All the grown-up males and females are spared, but the younger animals are all driven landwards, sometimes to the distance of a couple of miles, and then partly clubbed to death. Those which are only four months old are doomed without exception; while of the others only a certain number of the males are killed, and the females allowed to return again to the coast, when they soon betake themselves to the water. For several days after the massacre, the bereaved mothers swim about the island, seeking and loudly wailing for their young.