250 ORAL ARGUMENT OF HON. EDWARD J. PHELPS. 



say about this! Do tliey say tliat you can go on killinp,- females in 

 these increasin*;- proportions, for you have not failed to observe that the 

 business of pelaiiic sealin*;- has grown in respect tothenuniber of vessels 

 with great rapidity — do they assert that? jSTo. They attempt to parry 

 it only by saying, "Well, you exaggerate if. You might as well say 

 we exaggerate mathematics. That we exaggerate a demonstration of 

 geometry. It is a resnlt that comes mathematically; — certainly, by 

 natural laws from certain premises. 'Kobody can exaggerate it. It 

 does not need any exaggeration. 



They undertake, however, to say this is not the only factor in 

 extermination. This is not all there is, they say ; you are responsible for 

 some of it; there is a decrease that is alarming and x^ortentous, butit 

 is not all our fault. It is partially yours. Now, I x)ropose to examine 

 that question; not because it is really material, but because, so far as 

 time allows, I do not propose to leave any suggestion that my learned 

 friends thinlc imi)ortant euongh to make, and to rely upon, to be disre- 

 garded. We will meet them on their own ground on all these points. 



Let me first, however, call your attention to the conclusive mathemat- 

 ics that result from this evidence. I said a little while ago, in opening 

 the question of the proi)ortion of females, that reflection would show, 

 without any figures, that this business of killing the males ever since 

 1847 and s])aring the females, till ])elagic sealing prevented them, must 

 result in a preponderance. My learned associates have prepared for 

 my use a statemeut. It is in reply to the calculation that my learned 

 friend Sir Charles Russell presented, based on the diagrams bf the 

 American Commissioners which are given in connection with their 

 Eeport; and he arrives at a conclusion which certainly leads me to think 

 that he is not so much my superior in mathematics as he is in everything 

 else. He arrives at the conclusion that the diminution caused by pelagic 

 sealing on the statistics in this case is inconsiderable; or figuring it out 

 it is not large enough ever to exterminate the herd. How does he 

 reach that conclusion'? Simply by leaving out the most important fac- 

 tor in his sum. He treats these females as individuals, and takes no 

 account of their productive faculty. He does not take into account the 

 geometrical progression from year to year. If the same mathematics 

 were true in the increase of the human race we should not be here. 

 We should long ago have perished oft' the earth. It is the reproductive 

 power of the female sex which has kept the human race in its rapid 

 progression in number, even though the ratio of increase in humanity 

 is, of course, from many and obvious reasons, very much slower than the 

 progression of many animals of a lower grade. 



In reply to this suggestiou my learned friends on our side have pre- 

 pared some tables, which are nothing new. They are simply figures 

 which we make upon the evidence, in reply to his figures; but I cannot 

 make them understood without you have the kindness to glance at the 

 Report, They introduce, as I say, nothing new. They are only figures 

 based on the evidence in the case, and I shall be able to i^oint out what 

 there is of them, very briefly. They can be compared in their results 

 with the result that my learned friend has arrived at with his figures. 



The assumption of these tables should be first stated, in order that 

 they may be understood. We assume tlmt the seals born in any year 

 decrease annually at the several rates indicated in the diagrams of the 

 United States Commissioners. 



(See the United States Case, page 353.) That js from natural 

 causes, of course; that they decrease aside from anything that men 

 do; and it struck me that the ratio allotted by the Commissioners of 



