PROPERTY IN THE ALASKAN SEAL HERD. 71 



inhabitants of Great Britain, are wholly employed in the preparation of 

 the skins for market. The annual value of the manufactured product 

 can scarcely be less than $5,000,000 or $0,000,000. 



But this last mentioned utility, that which arises from the employ- 

 ment given to industry, is not absolute and permanent. If the 

 industry were destroyed by the total destruction of the seals, some 

 inconvenience would doubtless be felt before the labor could be 

 diverted into other channels. It could, however, and would, be so di- 

 verted, and the loss would thus be repaired. But, as already observed, 

 the case would be different with the loss inflicted upon those who usethe 

 skins. No substitute could supply this loss; nor would there be any 

 corresponding gain. In the case of some useful wild animals, the 

 American bison, for instance, which inhabit the earth and subsist upon 

 its fruits, and which are necessarily exterminated by the occupation of 

 the wild regions over which they roam, there is a more than compen- 

 sating advantage in the more numerous herds of tamed animals which 

 subsist upon the same food. But the seal occupies no soil which 

 would otherwise be useful. The food upon which it subsists comes 

 from the illimitable storehouses of the seas, and could not otherwise be 

 made productive of any distinct utility. 



We are next to take into more particular consideration the nature 

 and habits of the seal, and the other circumstances above adverted to 

 which enable us to measure the perils to which the existence of the 

 race is exposed, and the means by which these may be best counter- 

 acted. It is here that we encounter, for the first time, any material 

 contradiction and dispute in the evidence; and, inasmuch as it is in a 

 high degree important that we should ascertain the precise truth upon 

 these points, it should be clearly understood what evidence is really 

 before the arbitrators, and what measure of credit and weight should 

 be allowed to the different classes of evidence. Any critical and de- 

 tailed discussion of the evidence, if incorporated into the body of the 

 argument, might involve interruptions too much protracted in the chain 

 of reasoning, and will, for that reason, be separately presented in ap- 

 pendices; but some general notion should be had at the outset of the 

 relative importance of the various pieces of evidence. 



First. There is a large body of common knowledge respecting the 

 natural history of animals and the facts of animal life, which all intel- 

 ligent and well educated minds are presumed to possess. In the ab- 

 sence of those facilities, such as municipal tribunals afford for the pro- 



