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214 this dark, still, frowning bay. I can gloat on what I see here.

I watched these seals of mine on this, my first meeting with them, for a considerable time from the top of the cliffs—the glasses giving me a splendid view—and soon knew more about them than I had before, and got rid of some popular errors. For instance, I had always imagined that seals had one set attitude for lying on the rocks—viz. flat on their bellies—a delusion which every picture of them in this connection had helped to foster. Imagine my surprise and delight when it burst upon me that only some three or four were in this attitude, and that even these did not retain it for long. No; instead of being in this state of uninteresting orthodoxy, they lay in the most delightful free-thinking poses, on their sides, or much more than on their sides, showing their fine portly columnar bellies in varying degrees and proportions, whilst one utter infidel was right and full upon his broad back—yet looked like the carved image of some old crusader on the lid of his stone sarcophagus. Then every now and again they would give themselves a hitch, and bring their heads up, showing their fine round foreheads and large mild eyes; a very human—mildly human—and extremely intelligent appearance they had, looking down upon them from above. Again, they had the oddest or oddest-appearing actions, especially that of pressing their two hind feet or flippers together, with all their five webbed toes spread out in a fan,