ALASKA INDUSTRIES. - 425 



steadily decreasing- every year, and tliat it will require the utmost care 

 on the part of the Government to save them from total extinction. 

 Among other precautious, it will be necessary for the preservation of 

 the herd to prohibit the killing of the large young males whose skins 

 Aveigh more than 9 pounds, and care should be taken that no seals are 

 killed whose skins are so small that the lessees refuse to accept them 

 and pay the necessary tax. So far as my information goes, the Depart- 

 ment has never ruled upon the maximum and minimum weight of skins 

 to be taken, and the consequence has been that every agent in charge 

 of the islands established his own whim, without any two of them 

 being alike; and this has led to a demoralization of the whole system 

 of permanent rules for the guidance of Treasury agents, lessees, and 

 luitive sealers. 



A good plan would be to prohibit the killing of seals whose skins 

 weigh over 9 pounds, and to hold tlie lessees responsible for all under- 

 sized seals killed, excepting accidents. All rejected skins, whether cut, 

 stagey, or small, should be salted separately and sold on Government 

 account in San Francisco at the end of the sealing season. Seal skins 

 and fox skins given to the natives are used exclusively for trading in 

 liquor and other illicit articles which do not and can not benefit them 

 in any manner, and therefore ought to be discontinued. 



GI'AEDING THE ROOKEEIES. 



It will be necessary, too, to keep armed vessels in Bering Sea from 

 June 1 to December 1 of each year, and not less than two swift cutters 

 or cruisers shonld be employed in the immediate vicinity of the islands 

 during the period named. It is not necessary, nor is it just or wise, to 

 land armed crews of white men, soldiers or sailors, on the islands to 

 guard the rookeries, for if the cutters are kept iu the sea till the seals 

 leave the islands in December tliere will not be any danger of maraud- 

 ers landing there. 



I most earnestly call the attention of the Department to the fact that 

 the fewer strangers, whether guards, visitors, or others, allowed to 

 land or dwell upon the seal islands, the better it is for the native peo- 

 ple, who are rarely benefited by contact Avith white men. Until the 

 Treasury agents in charge of the islands a^^k for additional guards it 

 will be well for the Department to leave the care of the rookeries to the 

 Treasury agents and the natives, well armed. 



Put a Winchester rifle into the hands of every adult male on the 

 islands (they prefer 45-70) and then put agents in charge who are physi- 

 cally able to walk over the rough ground when it becomes necessary to 

 do so, and it will be found that no outsiders are needed there to do 

 guard duty. 



Houses were built near the more exposed rookeries in 1892 for the 

 comfort and convenience of the watchmen on guard duty, and 1 respect- 

 fully suggest that telephone lines be erected from such houses to the 

 Government house on each island. A line from Southwest Bay and 

 another from Northeast Point on St. Paul, and from Zapadnie and east 

 rookeries on St. George would be all sufficient. 



It does appear strange, in the light of recent events, that so very lit- 

 tle has been done for the proper protection of the rookeries, and, stran- 

 ger still, that there should be so little known of the real situation. The 

 truth is this, the natives are able and willing to guard the seals on the 

 rookeries, and they can do it easily and well if the Government will 

 only provide the means to do it as it ought to be done. 



