120 



second ninridian of west longitude, while Attn Island, on tlie one hnn- 

 dred and seventy-tliird meridian east is never visited by youn^? seals, 

 and therefore lies between the regular autumn migration routes of the 

 seals going from the Pribilof and Commauder Islands respectively." 

 Sees. 197, W8, 453, 454. 



10. The herd habitually resorting to the islands of St. Paul and 

 St. George is the same that has resorted there in the spring, 

 summer, and fall of every year for the past century and more 

 without any change whatever in their habits or in their migra- 

 tion routes. Since the discovery of the islands, the seals frequenting 

 them have never resorted, for any purpose whatever, to other coasts 

 or lands. This, no doubt, is due to the fact that they find on 

 the Pribilof Islands, and nowhere else, tlie isolation required for the 

 breeding season, as well as the climatic and iihysical conditions 

 necessary to their life wants, among which conditions are an uniformly 

 low temperature and an overcast sky and foggy atmosphere that serves 

 to protect them against the sun's rays while they remain at the 

 rookeries during the long summer season. Whatever may be the 

 reason for their never having landed upon any other shores, it is 

 indisputably shown that they have regularly resorted to those islands 

 as their breeding grounds for a period so long that the memory of man 

 runneth not to the contrary. And the contrary is not asserted. 



11. Prior to 1883 or 1885 the taking of these fur seals at sea was 

 exclusively by Indians or natives inside territorial waters, at any rate, 

 quite near the coasts. They employed for that purpose only small 

 canoes and harpoons or spears. Their catch, liowever, lias never been 

 large in any year, and has not materially affected the industry con- 

 ducted at the islands of St. Paul and St. George, nor apparently 

 diminished the number of the herd. 



But in 1883 a schooner manned by hunters skilled in taking 

 seals entered Bering Sea and returned with more than 2,000 seals. 

 This stimulated the business of taking tlicse animals in the open waters 

 beyond tlie territorial jurisdiction of the respective governments. 

 In 1885 firearms were first used in hunting seals. Large schooners 

 or vessels now go out into the ocean in the route traversed by the 

 seals and send out small boats manned by hunters with rifles or 

 Bhotguns. Ordiniirily, only the head of the seal can be seen as it 

 moves through, or lies asleep, in the water; those thus asleep being, 

 as a general rule, mother seals heavy with young, who, being dis- 



