The Manatees or Lamantins of the Atlantic Ocean, and the now nearly extinct Dugongs of the Indian seas, form the connecting link between the real whales and the seals and walruses. Like the whales, these animals have no hind feet, and a powerful tail, which is their chief instrument of locomotion; they are distinguishable, however, from them by less fin-like, more flexibly-jointed anterior extremities, on which they lean while cropping the sea-weeds on the shallow shores. When they raise themselves with the front part of their body out of the water, a lively fancy might easily be led to imagine that a human shape, though certainly none of the most beautiful, was surging from the deep. Hence they have been named sea-sirens, mermaids, and mermen, and have given rise to many extravagant fictions. Their intelligence is very obtuse, but their stolid calf-like countenance indicates great mildness of temper.
They live at peace with all other animals, and seem to be solely intent upon satisfying their voracious appetite. Like the hippopotamus, they swallow at once large masses of sea-plants or of juicy grasses growing beyond the water's edge on the borders of rivers.
The Manatees, or Sea-cows, as they are familiarly called, inhabit the coasts and streams of the Atlantic between 19° S. lat. and 25° N. lat., and attain a length of from eight to ten feet. Humboldt compares the flesh to ham, and Von Martius says he never tasted better meat in the Brazils. The South American monks, who have their own ideas on the classification of animals, consider it as fish, and fare sumptuously upon it during Lent. Besides its flesh, one single animal gives as much as 4000 bottles of oil, which is used both in cookery and for lighting. The thick hide is cut into stripes, from which straps or whips are made, to flog the unfortunate negroes. Useful in many respects, defenceless and easy to kill, particularly during the time of the inundations, when it ascends the great rivers, the manatee or sea-cow has been nearly extirpated in many parts where it formerly abounded, a fate which it partakes with the East Indian dugong. These animals might easily be enclosed and tamed, in the lagoons and bays of the tropical streams; but it is to be feared that they will have vanished from the face of the earth before the industry of man endeavours to introduce them, as it were, among the domestic animals.
The Seal family forms a still nearer approach to the land quadrupeds, as here hind feet begin to make their appearance. The shortness of these extremities renders their movements upon land generally awkward and slow, but they make up for this deficiency by an uncommon activity in the water. Their body, tapering fish-like from the shoulders to the tail, their abundance of fat, the lightness of which is so favourable to swimming, the position of their feet, admirably formed for rowing, paddling, and steering, their whole economy, in a word, is calculated for the sea. Although citizens of two worlds, their real element is evidently the water, from which their food is exclusively derived.
Female Dugong of Ceylon. (From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's Work on Ceylon.)
Skeleton of Seal.
Seals are found in almost all seas, but they particularly abound on the coasts of the colder regions of the earth, and diminish in size and numbers as they approach the torrid zone. Small seals are found near Surinam, but the giants of the family, the huge, sea-elephant, the sea-lion, the sea-bear, belong exclusively to those higher latitudes which the sun visits only with slanting rays, or where the winter forms a dreary and continuous night.
