ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 173 



Vital statistics of the islands for 1884 and 1885 are as follows : 



TAX ON SKINS. 



I beg to suggest that under present orders from your Department 

 the tax or duty is paid on the count as made by the counters detailed 

 for that purpose by the collector of customs at San Francisco, when in 

 my judgment the tax should be collected on the count of the agent of 

 the Treasury in charge of the islands making the shipment. Section 

 19G9 of the Revised Statutes requires the payment of a "revenue tax or 

 duty u])on each fur-seal skin taken and shipped." It is clearly contem- 

 plated by this section of the law that the tax shall be determined on 

 the count of the Treasury agent counting and shipping the skins. There 

 is another reason in favor of this view of the case. Suppose the vessel, 

 for any cause, should not be able to deliver all or any of the skins to the 

 collector at San Francisco to be counted under the order of a former 

 Secretary of the Treasury; would the lessees be liable to i)ay the duty 

 on the count of the Treasury agent? Or, in other words, does not the 

 Government under that order virtually guarantee the safe delivery of 

 the skins (so far as the duty is concerned) to the collector at San Fran- 

 cisco ? The lessees, having a greater money interest in the skins, would 

 no doubt use every means at their command to safely deliver the skins 

 to the collector; but I submit that the count made at the point of ship- 

 ment is the one contemplated by section 1969 of the law upon which 

 the tax should be paid. 



PIRATES. 



Three marauding vessels have been sighted this season cruising 

 around the islands of St. George and St. Paul, and have been heard 

 shooting seals in the water, but so far have not landed or disturbed 

 any of the rookeries. The Treasury agents on both islands keep vigi- 

 lant watch, but owing to the long distance between rookeries it would 

 be entirely possible for a vessel to land a crew in small boats and make 

 a killing on shore, and get away without being seen. Captain Loud 

 and myself have made two trips by boat and on foot to points where 

 shooting was reported by the natives to have been heard without 

 seeing the vessels or any evidence on shore of their having landed. 

 Mr. T. J. Ryan, assistant Treasury agent at St. George, watched a 

 schooner off Zapadnie rookery, St. George, for ten days. She remained 

 in sight most of the time, and sent her crew out in small boats to shoot 

 seals in the water, but was so far out at sea that she could not be reached 

 by open boat, the only means Mr. Eyan had at his command with which 

 to reach the pirate. On Sunday, the 12th of July, while the lessees' 

 steamer Dorrt was on her course from St. Michaels, via St. Paul, to IJna- 

 laska, she sighted a schooner about 15 miles from St. Paul, and, under 

 orders from me to go alongside of any suspicious craft he might fall in 

 with, he stood for the schooner with full steam and sail. When close 



