The Press., 1893-11-16
(Our Animal Friends.) AND THEIR KIN.

So canny and intelligent are otter fam flies, of which there are several, that man need not be ashamed of kinship with any of them. That variety which sometimes travels far inland to obtain food. scramb- ling awkwardly over the earth, but grace fully and swiftly ascending fresh=water courses, is not remotely allied to the bad ger family, while sea-otters are closely re= lated to seals.
 Sea-otters are very different in temper, habits, and affections from the common otter. They are large, handsome, but sadly solitary, when found as far south as the Yellow Sea and along the coast of Kamchatka, or the shores of Alaska and Aleutian Islands.
 A mother sea-otter rears her young, ot which she has only one at birth, appar- ently without aid from the father otter. and, indeed, without his or any compan. ionship. She tends hefse esby seloser to she edge of the water in order that she may seize it in her mouth and plunge into the deep sea should danger threaten it. Her devotion to it is lesson to humanity. She dearly loves her baby and the little one returns her affection with a quite hu- man devotion. Indeed, no infant sa-otte1 has been reared by man or woman. When separated from it's mother it dies of grief or starvation, refusing all food but that which is supplied by its mother. On the coast of Alaska and the Aleutian Islands and especially upon the reefs of the group known as the Sannack, the Indians have tried in vain to raise orphan sea-otters but the little creatures have invariably pined away and died. Ballow mentions a remark of a native who had been most tender to baby sea-otter. When it was dead the good fellow said tenderly, "Hin die of broke heart"
 The almost black variety of these aquatic quadrupeds is seldom, and per haps never, caught away from Behrine Sea, and even there they are becoming less and less frequent year by year. This fact is strange, considering the difficulty of catching them and the smanness of tht numbers annually secured.
 The rich, deep, dark fur of the Nortf American sea-otter, and also the tawny and almost yellow and beautiful skins O those caught upon Oriental shores, are O large value, especially in the estimation of the Russians.
 | In Behring Sea catch of one or two fine sea-otters in a year secures ptosperit, to an Indian, as he receives from fifty tt hundred dollars for each pelt from deal CTS, and sometimes much more than cha if the fur is exceptionally excellent. S, higly are sea-ootterrsg prized, and so dihicul is it to find and spear them, that, before an expedition is made to seek them, relig ious incantations are performed, and | ceremonial bath is taken; the bath, be ing an Indians utmost act of personal sac riice, proves the esteem he feels for sea etters. Their furs are richer and hand somer in winter than in summer, consc auentiy they are hunted at season whel the perils and discomforts of pursuin them upon storm-swept coasts are at thei utmost. The craft, skill and enduranc of successful hunters of sea- -otters is amaz ing, and it is all required to match tn skill and craft of the precious furry crea lures that ought surely te be spared, sino we can live very we'll without sacrificin