17 



Three years after the cession of Alaska, the Alaska Commercial 

 Company obtained a twenty-year lease of the Pribilov islands, the con- 

 sideration being an annual rental of $55,000 and besides a revenue tax 

 of two dollars on every skin taken. The maximum number of seal 

 skins allowed to be shipped was 100,000 per annum. As the original 

 cost or purchase price of Alaska was $7,200,000, it is seen that the 

 United States had almost from the beginning an income from these two 

 small islands alone of nearly four per cent, on their investment for the 

 whole territory. 



A few words about the seal itself. Professor Elliott, of the Smith- 

 sonian Institution, spent several years on the dismal Pribilov islands for 

 the express purpose of thoroughly studying seal life in all its phases, and 

 to him most of our accurate knowledge of seal life is due. As already 

 stated the first seal-fur of commerce came from the South Sea, hence 

 the name South Sea seal still obtains, although by far the greater number 

 of skins now come from the Alaskan or North Pacific waters. Whether 

 ever the Alaskan seals migrated from the South Sea, thereby crossing 

 the equator is not known, neither was it certainly known where these 

 animals spent the winter months till this was discovered in the course of 

 the investigations of the British Bering Sea Commission in 1891, when 

 it was ascertained that the greater part of this season was passed in the 

 waters adjacent to British Columbia and Southern Alaska. Prof. Elliott 

 says, " there are few, if any, creatures in the animal kingdom that can be 

 said to exhibit a higher order of instinct, approaching even our intelli- 

 gence " than the fur seal. 



A male in its prime, say six or seven years old, will measure 6^ to 7 y^ 

 feet from the tip of its nose to the end of its abbreviated, abortive tail, 

 and will weigh at least 400 pounds. The female on the other hand is 

 very much smaller, being from 4 to 4^2 feet long, and is only about 

 one-sixth of the weight of the male, but is much more shapely in its 

 proportions. The adult males are the first to arrive in the spring, be- 

 tween the 1st and 5th of May, on the seal grounds or rookeries on the 

 Pribilov Islands. It may be remarked also here that after the adult 

 males land, they never leave the island nor partake of any food whatso- 

 ever until they leave some months later in the fall to spend the winter 



