The most profitable portion of the unfortunate sea-horse is its tusks, which are composed of very hard, dense, and white ivory. This ivory is not so good, and consequently does not command so high a price, as elephant ivory, but is in high repute for the manufacture of false teeth, chessmen, umbrella handles, whistles, and other small articles.
The tusks are not an extra pair of teeth, but a development and modification of the canines. For about six or seven inches of their length they are solidly set in the mass of hard bone which forms the animal’s upper jaw. So far as they are imbedded in the head they are hollow, but mostly filled up with a cellular osseous substance containing much oil; the remainder of the tusk is hard and solid throughout.
The young walrus, or calf, has no tusks in its first year of existence; but in its second, when it is about the size of a large seal, it has a pair of much the same size as the canines of a lion. In the third year the tusks measure about six inches in length.
In size and shape they vary greatly, according to the animal’s age and sex. A good pair of bull’s tusks, says Mr. Lamont, will be twenty-four inches each in length, and four pounds each in weight; but larger and heavier specimens are of frequent occurrence. Cows’ tusks, it is said, will average fully as long as those of the bulls, because less liable to be broken, but seldom weigh more than three pounds. They are generally set much closer together than the bull’s tusks, sometimes even overlapping one another at the points; while those of the bull will often diverge as much as fifteen inches.
In scientific language the walrus, morse, or sea-horse (Trichecus), belongs to a genus of amphibious mammals of the family Phocidæ, a family including the well-known seals. It agrees with the other members of that family in the general configuration of the body and limbs, but distinctly differs from them in the head, which is remarkable,—as we have seen,—for the extraordinary development of the canine teeth of the upper jaw, as also for the protuberant or swollen appearance of the muzzle,—due to the size of their sockets and the thickness of the upper lip. This upper lip is thickly set with strong, transparent, bristly hairs, which measure about six inches in length, and are as thick as a crow-quill. The terrific moustache, with the long white curving tusks, the thick projecting muzzle, and the fierce and bloodshot eyes, give Rosmarus trichecus a weird and almost demoniacal aspect as it rears its head above the waves, and goes far to account for some of the legends of sea-monsters which embellish the Scandinavian mythology.
THE WALRUS, OR MORSE.
The walrus has no canine teeth in the lower jaw. Its incisors are small, and ten in number; six in the upper and four in the lower jaw. The molars, at first five on each side in each jaw, but fewer in the adult, are simple and not large; their crowns are obliquely worn. The nostrils would seem to be displaced by the sockets of the tusks; at least they both open almost directly upwards at some distance from the muzzle. The eyes are small, but savage; there are no external ears.
The Arctic walrus is the sole known species of the genus. It is a gregarious animal, always assembling in large herds, which occasionally leave the water to take their rest upon the shore or on the ice; and it is at such times the hunters chiefly attack them, since their movements out of the water are very laborious and awkward.
