`` I 've followed the poltoos -LSB- the halibut -RSB- for twenty years , and I ca n't say I 've found it yet . But look here -- you seem to have a fondness for talking to your betters -- suppose you go to Walrus Islet and talk to Sea Vitch . He may know something . Do n't flounce off like that . It 's a six-mile swim , and if I were you I should haul out and take a nap first , little one . '' Kotick thought that that was good advice , so he swam round to his own beach , hauled out , and slept for half an hour , twitching all over , as seals will . Then he headed straight for Walrus Islet , a little low sheet of rocky island almost due northeast from Novastoshnah , all ledges and rock and gulls ' nests , where the walrus herded by themselves . He landed close to old Sea Vitch -- the big , ugly , bloated , pimpled , fat-necked , long-tusked walrus of the North Pacific , who has no manners except when he is asleep -- as he was then , with his hind flippers half in and half out of the surf . `` Wake up ! '' barked Kotick , for the gulls were making a great noise . `` Hah ! Ho ! Hmph ! What 's that ? '' said Sea Vitch , and he struck the next walrus a blow with his tusks and waked him up , and the next struck the next , and so on till they were all awake and staring in every direction but the right one . `` Hi ! It 's me , '' said Kotick , bobbing in the surf and looking like a little white slug . `` Well ! May I be -- skinned ! '' said Sea Vitch , and they all looked at Kotick as you can fancy a club full of drowsy old gentlemen would look at a little boy .
Kotick did not care to hear any more about skinning just then ; he had seen enough XXXXX it .
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