ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 97 



Upon the rookeries, and by the application of the ordinary stock-breed- 

 ing principles not only to perpetuate, but to rapidly increase, the seal 

 herd. 



To one who has spent so many years among the seals as I have, and 

 who has taken so much interest in them, it does appear to be wrong 

 that they should be allowed to be so ruthlessly and indiscriminately 

 slaughtered by pelagic hunters, who secure only about one-fourth of ail 

 they kill. There is no doubt in my mind that unless immediate j)ro- 

 tection be given to the Alaskan fur seal the species will be practically 

 destroyed in a very few years; and in order to protect them pelagic 

 hunting must be absolutely prohibited. 



The foregoing is substantially the same testimony that I gave to the 

 commissioners who visited the islands in 1891. 



J. 0. liEDPATH. 



PRIBTLOF ROOKERIES. 



Deposition of Charles J. Gaff, Treasury agent in charge of Prihilof Islands. 



District of Columbia, 



City of Washington., ss: 



Charles J. Goff, of Clarksburg, W. Va., being duly sworn, deposes 

 and says: I am 45 years of age; during the years 1889 and 1890 I occu- 

 pied the position of special Treasury agent in charge of the Pribilof 

 Islands. I was located on St. Paul Island, only visiting St. George 

 IslaiKl occasionally. About the 1st of June, 1889, 1 arrived on St. Paul 

 Island, and remained there until October 12, 1889, when 1 returned to 

 San Francisco for the winter. Again went to the islands in 1890, arriv- 

 ing there about the last week in May, and remaining until August 12, 

 1890. Since that time I have never been on the islands. My principal 

 observations as to seal life upon the islands were confined to St. Paul 

 Island, as I only visited St. George Island occasionally. 



During my first year on the islands the Alaska Commercial Company 

 was the lessee thereof, and during my second year the North American 

 Coinmercial Company. In 1889 1 made careful observations of the rook- 

 eries on St. Paul Island and marked out the areas covered by the breed- 

 ing grounds; in 1890 I examined these lines made by me the former year 

 and found a very great shrinkage in the spaces covered by breeding 

 seals. 



In 1889 it was quite difficult for the lessees to obtain their full quota 

 of 100,000 skins. So difficult was it, in fact, that in order to turn off a 

 sufficient number of 4 and 5 year old males from the hauling grounds 

 for breeding purposes in the future the lessees were compelled to take 

 about 50,000 skins of seals of 1 or 2 years of age. I at once reported 

 this fact to the Secretary of the Treasury, and advised the taking of a 

 less number of skins the following year. Pursuant to such report the 

 Government fixed upon the number to be taken at 60,000, and further 

 ordered that all killing of seals on the islands should stop after the 20th 

 day of July. I was further ordered that I should notify the natives 

 upon the Aleutian Islands that all killing of seals while coming from or 

 going to the seal islands was prohibited. These rules and regulations 

 went into effect in 1890, and pursuant thereto I posted notices for the 

 natives at various points along the Aleutian chain, and saw that the 

 orders in relation to the time of killing and number allowed to be killed 

 were executed upon the islands. As a result of the enforcement of these 



H. Doc. 92, pt. 2 7 



