296 ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



iucreased steadily, until iu 1883-84 it was easy to take the quota of 100,000 between 

 June 1 and July 20, or at the rate of 2,000 a day. 



It was about this period the sealing schoonei's bejojan to appear in Bering Sea with 

 the regularity of the seals themselves, and as the schooners increased in numbi^r and 

 systematized their methods of taking seal, the seals decreased so rapidly that in 1889 

 it was found necessary by the lessees to take 40,000 small seals in order to till uj) the 

 quota of 100,000. 



Only 21,000 merchantable seals were taken by the lessees in 1890, although a great 

 effort was made to secure a larger catch. 



It is a well-known fact that from the time our Government took possession of the 

 seal islands in 1868 until 1883 there was not a sign of any diminution in the number 

 of seals coming uj^ou the rookeries. During my residence here I have endeavored to 

 get as much information as I possibly could from every source within reach, and I 

 never met a person who lived here any length of time Avho ever thought of attrib- 

 uting the destruction of seal life to any other cause than that of the sealing schooners. 

 Nor can an unpredjudiced person show any other cause after once witnessing the 

 destruction of seal life on the rookeries after a few days' o))erations of a schooner in 

 the immediate vicinity. The cows are shot and killed while passing between the 

 rookeries and the feeding hanks, and the pups, deprived of proper sustenance, die 

 upon the breeding grounds by thousands. 



It needs not a scientihc training to understand this thing, nor is there a native on 

 the islands so dull as not to understand it thoroughly in all its relations to the ques- 

 tion at issue. 



An effort has been made to show a decrease of seals because of a shortage of bulls, 

 and I was led into the belief of that theory until I investigated it for myself, and 

 found it to be erroneous and altogether untenable. 



Pursuant to instructions from you I visited the rookeries at different times between 

 July 7 and 22, and I carefully examined and noted their condition on the dates of 

 my several visits. It has been conceded on all sides that the rookeries are at their 

 fullest and best from the 10th to the 20th of July, and I found such to be the case 

 in every instance. 



During the earlier visits made by me I observed, and actually counted, all the 

 idle bulls on each rookery, and as the season advanced and the harems were iilled 

 with cows, the idle bulls become fewer and fewer, and yet, on the 22d of July, after 

 the cows were all in and had brought forth their young, I counted 1,250 vigorous 

 bulls idle and without cows; and in hundreds of instances I saw harems or families 

 where a bull had only 2 to 4 cows, although the luajority of the harems consisted of 

 from 30 to 40, a fact that proves there is a surplus of bulls and not a scarcity. 



I discovered very few cows without pups, and they were young cows coming on to 

 the breeding rookeries for the lirst time. 



V»^ere it true that bulls are scarce it would be very easy to prove it by the shortage 

 in the crop of pups; but it is not true, 'for there is hai'dly a cow on St Paul Island 

 that has not a pup by her side. The real and only cause of the rapid decrease in 

 seal life is the indiscriminate slaughter of the cows at sea. It is absurd to talk of 

 injuring the hertls by overdriving on land, because the cows are neither driven nor 

 disturbed by any person on the islands during the period of their stay there. 



Nor is it true that the lessees have ever injured the seals by overdriving. 



I have personally witnessed the driving and killing of seals by the lessees during 

 the seasons of 1889, 1890, and 1891, and it was all done under the immediate direction 

 and in the presence of the Treasury agents, and not one of them has ever claimed 

 that a seal was injured. 



No seals can, or ever coiild be, driven on the islands contrary to the will of the 

 Treasury agent, and I will venture the assertio7i that not one seal in ten thousand 

 has lieen injured by the lessees or their agents since we owned the seal islands. The 

 natives attend to the driving, exercising the utmost care that the pace shall be so 

 slow and steady that it is impossible to injure the seals. Overcrowding or over- 

 driving would be more injurious to the lessees than to any one else, and for that 

 reason alone they could not afford to permit it. 



Let it be borne in mind, too, that the local management of the islands has not 

 been turned over to new or inexperienced men since the lease has been awarded to 

 the North American Commercial Company; the two men who have superintended 

 the killing of seals for the i)ast twenty-two years are still in charge, and I know 

 they could not be expected to overdrive or allow it to be done. 



Whenever a seal is accidcntly injured on a drive, he is innnediately killed and 

 skinned and that is the last of the matter, for the death of a male seal is no injury 

 to the herd so long as the breeding seals are not disturbed or slaughtered. 



There is such a mass of evidence and from so many sources to prove the destruc- 

 tion of the seals by pelagic or deep-sea hunting, that no honest man thinks it neces- 

 sary to look for any other cause. 



