414 ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



At 7 a. m. I went down to the killing- grounds and followed the podding and club- 

 bing of the entire drive as brought up from the Reef crest and Zoltoi bluHs early this 

 morning The Zoltoi pod arrived on the ground long before the Reef pod — two hours 

 sooner. It was made up largely of "polseecatchie" and yearlings — the oldest bulls 

 thus far of the season, 6 and 7 year olds: and in this drive were many bulls which 

 the natives said, as they pointed them out, had come over from the Lagoon killing 

 yesterday; they knew the individuals by certain clubbing marks, etc. 



Tlio seals turned aside this morning were exclusively yearlings and "short" 2-year- 

 olds, and a large number of " half bulls." No "long" 2-year-old escaped; so, there- 

 fore, many 5^ and 6 pound skins will appear in this catch. Tiiere Avas, however, a 

 notable absence of 2-year-olds in proportion to the number driven, and the bulk of the 

 catch was 3-year-olds, as was yesterday's killing, with a very largenumber of 4-year- 

 olds in proportion for the small number of skins secured. A few cows appeared in 

 the drive ; two of them were rookery cows, and two or three were what I called " bar- 

 ren females" in 1872-1874. It is impossible, as the driving is now conducted, to avoid 

 getting a few cows in the herd, since nearly two-thirds of that drive this morning 

 came from the breeding lines on the Reef crest. Driving thus from the close prox- 

 imity of breeding lines was not done in 1872-1874; and then, too, I never saw such 

 an extraordinary number of 6-year-old bulls driven up here, before. True it was 

 that in 1872 great numbers of these vagrants, or whipped bulls, were to be seen »>n 

 the hauling grounds then: yet the natives could and did "walk them out" at the 

 start, so, very few of them came along in the drive. I have often watched them 

 cut out these large young bulls and any older ones from the drives as they started 

 from English Bay or Lukauuon. They don't do it now; they are afraid to lose a 

 single eligible seal. 



June 27, 1890. 



In 1872-1874 very little attention was paid to driving seals until the 12th or 14th 

 of June. True it was, that bands of thousands of holluschickie were then many days 

 long before that date, hauled out on the several resorts: yet then, because these ani- 

 mals were not in greater numbers, and were nearly all of them down by the surf 

 margin, it was deemed best to wait until the 12th or 14th before beginning in earnest 

 to drive. But, after the 14th of June usually there was such an abundant supply 

 of holluschickie ou hand within 1^ miles of this village, and from the salt house at 

 Northeast Point, that no concern was ever given as to the number that they could 

 get — it was the number that they should get (just the other way from the present 

 condition and desire) — for if it was a warmish, dry day in 1872, then only a small 

 drive, so as to get some 1,200 or 1,500 skins, was made. If it was a cool, favorable 

 day, then the driving would be so ordered as to bring in some 2,500 or 3,000 skins, 

 which was about the utmost number that they could handle at the village in those 

 times, per diem, under the most favorable circumstances. 



How difterent now ! eighteen years since the aboA'^e-cited order of aft'airs on this 

 ground. By the 6th of June the most eager, energetic driving began simultaneously 

 with the arrival of each and every squad of holluschickie, and has been kept up ever 

 since; but up to the 11th of Juno these drives were nothing better than "food drives," 

 so scant was the supnly of killable seals. 



June 28, 1890, 5 a. m. 



The superb sealing weather still continues. The natives are bringing up a small 

 squad from the Reef (some 1,300) as 1 write. Not a single seal on the sands of Zoltoi 

 this morning, nor has there been one since the last drive, 24th instant, or any prior 

 to that this season. This is remarkable — most remarkable. This squad of hollus- 

 chickie driven up from the Crest, when released from the several pods on the killing 

 grounds adjacent to Zoltoi, went directly to the sea over by Gull Hill, then headed 

 back for the Reef Point — a few for Ketavie, and many of the "half bulls" actually 

 hauled out under Gull Hill and Grassy Summit in less than an hour after their 

 release from the driven herd, in which they formed quite a large element this 

 morning. 



As these field notes of my daily iuvestigation last summer appear 

 seriatim and in extenso in Section VIII, following, I will make but one 

 more quotation in this connection illustrative of the utter failure of the 

 supply of killable seals over 1 year old on these islands to-day. 



June 30, 1890. 

 * * * Theshamt'fulsignificanceof this day's work can be seen by the most casual 

 observer. I counted over twenty-four "moon-eyed" or blind or semiblind hollus- 

 chickie as they escaped in the several "zujjooskas," all of Avhich have been crippled 

 in this manner this season by thoeliects of prior driving! How many of theseyear- 

 lings and "short" 2-year-ol<l8 that were released this morning, will again be driven 

 before the season is over? Nearly all of them. They pass from tlie pods into the 

 sea over the Lagoon bar; they meet squadrons of cows playing and lolling in the 

 water around the rookeries ; they pause, listen, and joininthe general comfort which 

 the water certainly affords them ; and, as the females and fresh arrivals of their own 



