Untitled - Memorial University's Digital Archives Initiative

- 7 -
To my mind ve should make every endeavor to ascertain not-e about the seals
a nd t he i r movements, ha bits an d r e s or t s at ce r t a i n seasons of the year. There are
s cores of old sea Lchunt.er-a up Nor t h ( en d more particularly t he veteran Capt. Fr-ank
Ash) whose opinions would be dnv e luabke-c-vho possess funds of information if it
could be placed on record . They have studied the matter through lif e - t hey are
ob se rvant and they have heard their f orefathers talk 1t aver .
Particulars have
come dovn to them fror:l tradition, a nd I am sure any of tllebl vho vish
to expres s
their opinion s up on the " main patch" or any other patch, viII be r eadily given a
place in t he cc'lumn e of our newspapers to do 8 0 .
We r equire s Oll'lftthl ng Bound and
practical
1n the first place f rom ee n 'Who have visited the ice-floes from boyhood
. They mW'lt necessarily posess valuable information, and , after \1'3 eet 'thef.rvde
v a on the movements and
babd t e of se als, there viII be plenty of time to l i st en
to the naturalists and sc i ent ists a f t erw ards, and the pr obability i s they never
saw a seaI in t l':el r lives , except a s tuf f ed one in 8. MufleUlll. Anyhot./, scfentdets
or no s ci ent ists, we should do all in our pove r t o pre serve t.he bedfaee r- seals .
They are t he breeders of the future f or us to l ook a f ter . This last reear-k may
not be scientific, but it i s c ommon sens e .
,:,.-" -.
.~