ORAL ARGUMENT OF HON. EDWARD J. PHELPS. 273 



fore, it is only on this point in which Mr. Elliott is completely answered, 

 when we [)()int out tliat the reclrivin"; that he objects to never took 

 place before 1890; and while he seems to assume in some of these 

 rhetorical passages that it has, he does not say so, and could not say 

 so without saying" that which is nuLrue. Neither does he cite any 

 authority. 



If my learned friend does not like Judge Swan I will refer him to 

 what Mr. Tui)per says about him. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — I did not say that I disliked Mr. Justice 

 Swan. 



Mr. Phelps. — T do not mean to say tliat you did, but Mr. Tupper 

 in a letter in the Jiritish Case page 3, has the following critk-ism made 

 upon Mr. Elliott by Mr. W. L. Morris. It is not Mr. Tupper's, but he 

 cites it. He says Mr. Morris says : 



This man seems to be the natural foe of Ahiska, prosecuting and persecuting her 

 with the brush and the pen of an expert, whenever and wlierever ho can get an audi- 

 ence, and I attribute the present forlorn condition of the territory more to his 

 ignorance and misrepresentation than to all other causes combined. . . 



And Mr. Tupper then goes on to say. 



His evidence in 1888 is open advocacy of the United States contention. His 

 ■writings and reports prior to the dispute will be referred to and it will be submitted 

 that his statements and experiences before 1888 hardly support his later theories. 



That is what we say; and Dr. Dawson, one of the British Commis- 

 sioners, estimates Professor Elliott like this. Judge Swan — see the 

 United States Counter Case, page 414, quotes Dr. Dawson as follows. 



Elliott's work on seals is amusing. 1 have no hesitation in saying that there is 

 no important point that he takes up in his l)ook tliat he does not contradict some- 

 where else in the same covers. . . His work is superficial in the extreme. 



This is really trilling, and it is of no importance at all. On this 

 subject he constructs a theory, and it is but a theory. How could 

 anybody come to a conclusion about the effect upon an animal of this 

 kind, wliich he seeks to attribute to it. There is only one way, and 

 that is to wait the result of experience. Time will tell. Notliing else 

 will tell, unless indeed it were something that is not pretended to exist 

 in this case, some such special exterior injury as would show for itself 

 what its consequences must be. 



I pass over much more that I could say on this point, pointing out 

 the errors of his reasoning and his mistakes in point of fact upon this; 

 but T do not think the case requires it. 



But n(nv, that we are upon Mr. Elliott I want to verify what I said 

 just now in reference to his support of the contention of the United 

 States; and I will just name the points on which you will find he does 

 support the contention of the United States. I read from i>age GO of his 

 Report. These are detached passages, but you have the lieiJort and 

 the context is all before you : 



The polygamous habit of this animal is such that, by its own volition, I do not 

 think that more than one male annually out of fifteen born is needed on the breeding- 

 grounds in the future: 



Then, on page 118. 



In this admirably perfect method of nature are those seals which can be properly 

 killed without injury to the rookeries, selected and held aside by their own voli- 

 tion, so tliat the natives can visit and take them witiiont distuibing, in the least 

 degree, the entire ([uiet l)reeding-ground, where the stock is perpetuated, 



B S, PT XV 18 



