154 THE COWS. 



We went into the Bering Sea about the 26th or 28th of June, and 



while in there we caught 389 seals, nearly all of 



27(08. Lyons, p. 460. which were mother seals in milk, which fact I 



know from seeing- the milk flow on the deck while 



we were skinning them. We took them a good ways from the islands, 



but do not know how many miles. 



When the pups are a few days old the mothers leave them (gen- 

 erally soon after coitus upon the rookeries with 

 H. H. Mdntyre, p. 41. the old male) to go to the feeding grounds, re- 

 turning at intervals of one to three or four days 

 to suckle their young. 



We sailed from Victoria in June and went due north, and commenced 

 sealing in the Bering Sea, catching about 400 

 Wm. McLaughlin, p. 462. seals. We hunted around the islands there, from 

 50 to 00 miles offshore. Most of those were fe- 

 males that had given birth to their young and were with milk. 



Q. How far from the islands have you killed those mother seals that 

 were in milk ? — A. I have killed them as far off 



Alex. McLean, p. 438. as 150 miles off the land. 



Q. Is that in the Pacific or Bering Sea? — A. 

 Both in the Pacific and Bering Sea. 



Q. They were evidently the mothers that had young 1 ? — A. Yes, sir; 

 they had their young. Some of the seals had left their young on t\\e is- 

 lands and were going away, and were through with them or going to feed. 

 Sometimes a seal goes a long way off the island at a certain time. It 

 depends where the feed is. A seal does not think very much of trav- 

 eling 100 miles; they travel very fast when they want to. 



Q. Did you ever kill any cow seals that were in milk that had given 

 birth to young and were in milk? — A. Yes, sir; I 

 Dan'l McLean, p. 444. have in Bering Sea. 



Q. How far from the seal islands were they? — 

 A. Sixty miles; all the way from 20 to GO miles; off St. George and St. 

 Paul. 



It may safely be asserted that over three-fourths of the catch of 

 forty-eight were cows in milk. This, at a distance 

 Robert H.McManus p. of 200 miles from the rookeries, shows that the 

 nursing cows ramble all over the Bering Sea in 

 search of their chief food, the codfish, which are to be found on the 

 banks along the coast of the Aleutian Islands. During the migratory 

 journey north in the spring the cows with young become the easiest 

 victims to the hunter, owing to being more fatigued, and consequently 

 sleep more than other class of seals. From all information I could 

 glean from the skipper, when I pointed out the circumstance of cows 

 in milk being killed so far from the islands, leads me to understand 

 that had the cruise of the Otto been a month or six weeks earlier, the 

 proportion of nursing cows in a catch would be still greater than that 

 herein exhibited. 



Each year we would enter the Bering Sea about June, and we sealed 

 from 50 to 150 miles from the islands. The first 



Thos. Madden, p. 463. year we caught about 700 seals iu the sea, and 

 we caught very big catches in 1888 and 1889, but 



