164 



shall be preserved from destruction so that mankind can get the ben 

 elitof them for food and for raiment; to that end these ishiDds shall not, 

 as is the case in respect to other parts of the pnblic domain, be subject 

 to settlement, but shall be sot apart as the habitation of these animals 

 exclusively, where they may breed and rear their young; and they shall 

 be protected from molestation by seal-hunters while on the islands, 

 and only such portion of males allowed to be taken, annually, as will 

 not endanger the integrity of the herd as a whole." All this, it is 

 argued by counsel for the British Government, is not equivalent to 

 "occupation," as that word is understood in the law regulating the 

 acquisition of property in animals /'era' nalurcv, and is of less con- 

 sequence, as a means of acquiring property in these seals, than that 

 which is done when a hive is i)rovided for bees, or boxes for pigeons, 

 or a place for deer. The fact is, the case of these seals is made stronger 

 in consequence of their peculiar nature and habits of life; their home 

 on American soil is a permanent home, necessary to their existence, 

 and in respect to which they never lose the animus revcrtendi. 



Again, it has been suggested that these animals pass much of their 

 time in the high seas, which are free to all, for purposes of food. But 

 that is (piite as immaterial as to say, in the case of bees and pigeons, 

 that they pass the most, or much, of their time in the open air, which is 

 free to all. The circumstance that these fur seals go- great distances 

 from the Pribilof Islands in search of food can not affect the princi[)le 

 involved. Suppose they passed each day in the sea, just beyond the 

 outer line of territorial waters, but returned each night to the islands; 

 the question of ownership would be i)recisely the same, in respect to 

 the principles governing it, as is now presented, because we know that 

 while these seals go regularly, at stated periods, each year, over the 

 same route, into the North Pacific Ocean, they return by the same route 

 substantially, at the same time in each year, to their breeding grounds on 

 the islands of St. Paul and St. George. The length of time which they 

 pass in the high seas, in search of food, is wholly immaterial, in view 

 of the fact that they will return at a particular time to their land home. 

 They are unlike in their habits any other known animal that passes its 

 time partly on land and partly in the high seas. They are not produ(;ts 

 of the sea. They can not breathe under the water. They are, in every 

 substantial sense, as much appurtenant to the islands on which they 

 are born, and where they breed and rear their young, as if they never 



