292 ARGUMENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 



this if it were not obliged to seek the shore for so trifling an object as 

 giving birth to its young certainly deserves to be classed among the 

 curiosities of nature. The difference between animals (now) always 

 pelagic and those (in the future) entirely pelagic may not readily be 

 understood without explanation not vouchsafed. How cau they be al- 

 ways pelagic if they are obliged to seek the land or perish and why is 

 it reasonable to talk of the probability of their becoming something 

 different from what they are when that conjecture is based upon noth- 

 ing but reckless and grotesque assumption? Of course this and other 

 specimens of affront to common sense are merely gratuitous and point- 

 less vagaries. But the thesis must be sustained viz: that the seals are 

 not even amphibious animals; their resort to land is a merely accidental 

 necessity, and therefore the United States can no more claim a right 

 to or possession in them than in other " essentially pelagic animals," 

 such as the whale, the codfish, or the turbot. 



If anything more were needed to emphasize the absurdity of this 

 defiance of well-known facts and settled distinctions in the animal world 

 we might still further cite the British Commissioners on the subject of 

 the seal pelage or shedding of hair. It seems that these pelagic animals 

 were not endowed by nature with the proper skin to perform this func- 

 tion in their native element. Unless they can find a suitable place 

 out of water tbey retain the old hair and disregard the laws which 

 would compel an annual shedding. Lest this seem an exaggeration, read 

 their Report citing Mr. Grebnitsky: "During the l stagey' or shedding 

 season their pelage becomes too thin to afford a suitable protection from 

 the water. (See section 202, also 281, 631, 632.) 



It is hardly necessary to say that this theory, so gravely and seri- 

 ously advanced, that the seal is naturally and essentially a pelagic 

 animal, is utterly unsustained by evidence, is refuted by the language 

 of the Commissioners themselves and disputed by elementary writers. 

 It is only necessary to ascertain how naturalists define pelagic animals 

 and then compare such definition with the known characteristics and 

 rudimentary elements of seal life (see especially for this the books of 

 Johns Hopkins University). Besides, the unanimous and unquestioned 

 testimony of the agents for the Government and the company shows 

 that the fur-seals spend at least four months of the year on the Fribilof 

 Islands. 



Having found, with the American Commissioners, a marked diminu- 

 tion in the number of seals on and habitually resorting to the Pribilof 

 Islands, the British Commissioners proceed to show that the seals are 



