The walrus is one of the largest animals still extant, and although the element of personal danger is not so great in hunting it as in hunting some beasts of lesser bulk, yet the conditions under which the sport is pursued, as well as the nature of the sport itself, are such as will probably tempt one who has once tried this form of sport to return to it.

An average-sized four-year-old walrus will measure ten feet in length and about the same in girth. The weight is, of course, difficult to determine; but it is probably about 3000 pounds, of which 350 pounds may be reckoned as blubber, and 300 pounds as hide.

The blubber, to be utilized, is mixed with that of the seals which may be obtained, and the oil, which is extracted by heat and pressure, sold as “seal oil”; the hide, which is from an inch to an inch and a half in thickness, and makes a soft, spongy leather, is exported principally to Russia and Germany, where it is used for making harness and other heavy leather goods.

The walrus is a carnivorous animal, feeding mostly upon shellfish and worms, and is therefore generally found in the shallow waters along a coast line, diving for its food on banks which lie at a depth of from two to twenty fathoms below the surface. Deeper than that the walrus does not care to go; in fact, it generally feeds in about fifteen fathoms.

The tusks are principally used to plow up the bottom in search of food, but are also employed as weapons, and in climbing upon the ice. They are composed of hard white ivory, set for about six inches of their length in a hard bony mass, about six inches in diameter, which forms the front of the head; the breathing passage runs through this mass, and terminates in two “blow holes” between the roots of the tusks. The tusk itself is solid, except that portion which is imbedded in the bone, and this is filled with a cellular structure containing a whitish oil.

A walrus killed in the water immediately sinks; even if mortally wounded, it will in nine cases out of ten escape, and sink to the bottom. When on the ice, these animals always lie close to the water, and it is therefore necessary to kill them instantly, or they will reach the water and be lost before the boat can arrive within harpooning distance. This can only be done by shooting them in such a way as to penetrate the brain, which is no easy matter. The brain lies in what appears to be the neck; that which one would naturally suppose to be the head being nothing but the heavy jaw bones, and mass of bone in which the tusks are set.

What becomes of the walrus in winter it is hard to say; but I have heard them blowing in an open pool of water among the ice on the north coast of Spitzbergen in the month of December. In the spring, however, when the ice begins to break up, they collect in herds on their feeding grounds around the coasts, where they may be found diving for shellfish, or basking and sleeping, singly or in “heaps” of two or three, often five or six, together.

They seem to prefer to lie on small cakes of flat bay ice; a single walrus will often take his siesta on a cake only just large enough to float him, and it is among such ice, therefore, rather than among rough old pack and glacier blocks, that they should be sought, although I have seen them lying on heavy old water-worn ice, four and five feet above the water. In this case, however, they had no choice.

The boats of the walrus hunters are strongly yet lightly built. They are bow-shaped at both ends; the stem and stern posts are made thick and strong in order to resist the blows of the ice, and the bow sheathed with zinc plates to prevent excessive chafing. It is most important that they should be easy and quick in turning, and this quality is obtained by depressing the keel in the middle. They are painted red inside and white outside, so that they may not be conspicuous amongst ice, but the hunters stultify this idea to some extent by dressing themselves in dark colors.

The harpoon, the point and edges of which are ground and whetted to a razor-like sharpness, is a simple but very effective weapon. When thrust into a walrus or seal, a large outer barb “takes up” a loop of the tough hide, whilst a small inner fishhook barb prevents it from becoming disengaged, so that when once properly harpooned, it is seldom, if ever, that an animal escapes through the harpoon “drawing.” The harpoon line consists of sixteen fathoms of two-inch tarred rope, very carefully made of the finest hemp, “soft laid”; each line is neatly coiled in a separate box placed beneath the forward thwart.

A boat’s crew consists of four or five men, and the quickness with which they can turn their boat is greatly accelerated by their method of rowing and steering. Each man rows with a pair of oars, which he can handle much better than one long one when amongst ice.

The harpooner, who commands the boat’s crew, rows from the bow thwart, near the weapons and telescope, which he alone uses. It is he who searches for game, and decides on the method of attack when it is found. “No. 2,” generally the strongest man in the boat, is called the “line man”; it is his duty to tend the line when a walrus is struck, and to assist the harpooner.

In such a boat, then, one lovely September morning, we are rowing easily back to the sloop, which is lying off Bird Bay, a small indentation in the east face of the northernmost point of Spitzbergen. The harpooner is balancing himself, one foot on the forward locker, and one on the thwart, examining through a telescope something which appears to be a lump of dirty ice, about half a mile away. Suddenly he closes his glass and seizes the oars. “There he is!” he says, and without another word the boat is headed for the black mass.

Now we are within a couple of hundred yards, and each man crouches in the bottom of the boat, the harpooner still in the bow, his eyes intently fixed upon the walrus. Suddenly the walrus raises his head, and we are motionless. It is intensely still, and the scraping of a piece of ice along the boat seems like the roar of a railway train passing overhead on some bridge. Down goes the head, and we glide forward again. The walrus is uneasy; again and again he raises his head and looks round with a quick motion, but we have the sun right at our back, and he never notices us.

At last we are within a few feet, and with a shout of “Wake up, old boy!” which breaks the stillness like a shot, the harpooner is on his feet, his weapon clasped in both hands above his head. As the walrus plunges into the sea, the iron is buried in his side, and, with a quick twist to prevent the head from slipping out of the same slit that it has cut in the thick hide, the handle is withdrawn and thrown into the boat. Bumping and scraping amongst the floating ice, we are towed along for about five minutes, and then stop as the wounded walrus comes to the surface to breathe.

In the old days the lance would finish the business, but now it is the rifle. He is facing the boat; I sight for one of his eyes, and let him have both barrels, without much effect apparently, for away we rush for two or three minutes more, when he is up again, still facing the boat. He seems to care no more for the solid “Express” bullets than if they were peas; but he is slow this time, and, as he turns to dive, exposes the fatal spot at the back of the head, and dies.

Few men are likely ever to forget the first occasion on which they found themselves amongst a herd of walrus in the water. Scores of fierce-looking heads—for the long tusks, small bloodshot eyes, and moustache on the upper lip (every bristle of which is as thick as a crow quill) give the walrus an expression of ferocity—gaze, perhaps in unbroken silence, from all sides upon the boat, See! the sun glints along a hundred wet backs, and they are gone.

Away you row at racing speed to where experience tells you they will rise again. “Here they are! Take that old one with long tusks first!” A couple of quick thrusts, right and left, and away you go again, fast to two old fellows that will want a good deal of attention before you can cut their tusks out. Indeed, unless one has served his apprenticeship, he had better not meddle with the harpoon at all. The old skippers and harpooners can spin many a yarn of lost crews and boats gone under the ice through a fatal moment’s delay in cutting free from the diving walrus.

—From “Big Game Shooting.”