PROPERTY IN THE ALASKAN SEAL HERD. 45 



jurisprudence, it appears, immediately, that there is no rule or prin- 

 ciple to the effect that no wild animals are the subject of property. On 

 the contrary we find that from an early period in the Roman law a 

 distinct consideration has been given to the question, what animals, 

 commonly designated as wild, are the subjects of property, and to what 

 extent. And the doctrine established by that law, and adopted, it is 

 believed, wherever that law has been received as the basis of municipal 

 jurisprudence wa3 also carried into the jurisprudence of England at 

 the first stage of its development, and has ever since been received 

 and acted upon by all English-speaking nations. It is well expressed 

 in the Commentaries of Blackstone: 1 



II. Other animals that are not of a tame and domestic nature are 

 either not the objects of property at all or else fall under our other 

 division, namely, that of qualified, limited, or special property, which is 

 such as is not in its nature permanent, but may sometimes subsist and 

 at other times not subsist. In discussing which subject, I shall, in the 

 first place, show how this species of property may subsist in such ani- 

 mals as are/em natures, or of a wild nature, and then how it may sub- 

 sist in any other things when under particular circumstances. 



First, then, a man may be invested with a qualified, but not an 

 absolute property in all creatures that are fierce natarm, either per indus- 

 triam, propter impotentiam, or propter privilegium. 



1. A qualified property may subsist in animals fierce naturce, per indus 

 triam Jiominis, by a man's reclaiming and making them tame by art, indus- 

 try, and education, or by so confining them within his own immediate 

 power that they can not escape and use their natural liberty. And un- 

 der this head some writers have ranked all the former species of ani- 

 mals we have mentioned, apprehending none to be originally and nat- 

 urally tame, but only made so by art and custom, as horses, swine, and 

 other cattle, which, if originally left to themselves, would have chosen 

 to rove up and down, seeking their food at large, and are only made do- 

 mestic by use and familiarity, and are, therefore, say they, called man- 

 sueta, quasi manui assueta. But however well this notion may be 

 founded, abstractly considered, our law apprehends the most obvious 

 distinction to be between such animals as we generally see tame, and 

 are therefore seldom, if ever, found wandering at large, which it calls 

 domitce naturae, and such creatures as are usually found at liberty, which 

 are therefore supposed to be more emphatically fierce natures, though it 

 may happen that the latter shall be sometimes tamed and confined by 

 the art and industry of man — such as are deer in a park, hares or 

 rabbits in an inclosed warren, doves in a dove house, pheasants 

 or partridges in a mew, hawks that are fed and commanded by 

 their owner, and fish in a private pond or in trunks. These are no 

 longer the property of a man than while they continue in his keeping 

 or actual possession ; but if at anytime they regain their natural liberty 

 his property instantly ceases, unless they have animum revertendi, which 

 is only to be known by their usual custom of returning. A maxim 

 which is borrowed from the civil law, u revertendi animum videntur desi- 

 nere habere tunc, cum revertendi consuetudinem deseruerintP The law, 



'Book II, p. 391. 



