32 



frozen ocean, not less than 4,000 miles in length. The claims of 

 Great Britain, Russia, Spain, and the United States to certain 

 boundaries along this great reach were based on alleged discoveries 

 and occupation, all of the most iudefinito character, and all ditiputcd, 

 except that Russia held and occupied the islands and coasts on all 

 sides of Bering Sea and this claim was not disputed by any country. 

 This claim was thus held and recognized for many years before ISli-l, 

 reaching back to the discovery and exploration of Bering Sea. 



The interest of Russia in these wild and inhospitable regions was 

 not agricultural, for they are unfit for such pursuits. It was not an 

 ambitious desire for territorial aggrandizement on the American con- 

 tinent, for Russia took no steps to increase her population there 

 beyond the numbers necessary to secure and handle the fur trade; and 

 when she found it inconvenient to incur the expense of governing a 

 colony so far away from her capital, that yielded so small a revenue, 

 she sold all her possessions and dominion in that region east of 170° 

 of west longitude to a power that had always been friendly and was 

 not in any sense her rival. 



Fishing was not so profitable in Bering Sea as to induce fishermen to 

 encounter the unpleasant and short summer season when it was prac- 

 ticable to fish there and establish any regular business in taking fish. 

 The markets were too distant to justify them to transport their catch 

 fresh on ice, and there was not suflBcient sunshine to enable them to 

 properly cure the fish. In consequence the business of fishing was 

 never permanently established in Bering Sea, and is not until this time. 



Russia directed the energy and capital of her people to the collection 

 of furs as the only really valuable industry in that region, and created 

 monopolies in their favor and gave them large powers of legislation, 

 all directed to the same end., and all protected by her naval power in a 

 thoroughly systematic and effectual way. 



These privileges were retained and exercised exclusively by Rus- 

 sian subjects under her laws until the Alaskan region was sold to the 

 United States in 1807, with all the rights and dominion that Russia 

 had therein. In order to extinguish in thiit region all claim of rights 

 existing under Russian authority it was stipulated in the treaty of 

 cession that all former grants of exclusive privileges to any of the 

 Russian subjects should be abrogated. 



It was in pursuance of the same authority and manifestly for these 

 reasons that the right of trading with the natives and of taking and 



