more modified in relation to an aquatic life, would here have considerably the advantage of them. But the reverse is the case, at least if one can at all judge from a comparison of the swimming powers of the two kinds as exhibited in captivity. Never have I seen anything more wonderful than the way in which these otariidæ tore through the water, when pieces of fish were thrown to them, in that wretched concrete basin which disgraces both our humanity and common sense at that beast-Bastille of our Gardens. The speed seemed really—I do not say it did—to approach to that of a galloping horse, and, in comparison to it, that of the seal, which could get nothing, and had to be fed afterwards, might almost be called slow. Yet whilst the latter swam with the motions of a fish, and looked like one, the other had more the appearance of a quadruped gone mad in the water. The great fore-flippers were largely used—indeed, they seemed to do the principal part of the work—whilst the much smaller ones of the common seal were pressed, as here, against the sides, and progress was almost wholly due to the fish-like motions of the posterior part of the body, and the hind feet or paddles, making, together, the tail. This was many years ago, when the common seals at the Gardens used to occupy the larger, or, to speak more properly, the less minute of the two concrete basins provided for oceanic animals. It was not till after the arrival of their more showy relatives that these poor creatures—the homely dwellers about our own
