XIV[ToC]
BEASTS BIG AND LITTLE
Both on sea and land, Labrador animals have to be as tough as Labrador people to stand the hard life they must lead.
Dr. Grenfell tells of a seal family he saw killed on an ice-pan about half the size of a tennis-court.
They were surprised by four sealers, with wooden bats. Before they gave up their lives they put up a tremendous struggle. The father seal actually caught a club in his mouth and swung it from side to side with such violence that the sealers had to get off the pan.
But at last he was dealt such a blow on the head that it was supposed he was killed.
Instead of stripping off the pelt as the fallen monster lay on the pan, the sealers hoisted him aboard the steamer "unscalped." As he was being lifted over the rail—two thousand pounds of him—the strap broke, and back into the sea the huge carcass splashed.