DRIVING. 237 



I have driven seals from all the rookeries and under the directions of 

 several chiefs, and I know the orders were always 

 very strict about the care we must take of the John Fratis, p. 107. 

 seals on the road. ISTo drives were made in warm 



weather; the seals were not hurried, but every once in awhile they 

 were allowed to stop and rest. The men who did the driving were 

 relieved from time to time, so that no man should get too cold on the 

 drive, and when the sun came out warm the drive was always aban- 

 doned and the seals allowed to go into the sea. I never saw the seals 

 overdriven or overheated, nor have I ever seen a seal die on the drive, 

 except one or two occasionally smothered. 



The drivers carry their knives along, and when a seal dies they skin 

 him and the skin is brought to the salt house and counted in with the 

 others. 



An overheated seal would not be worth skinning, and for that reason 

 the company agent is particular that the seals are not overheated. I 

 have clubbed seals, too, and at present I am a regular clubber. 



The driving from the hauling grounds to the killing grounds was 

 always conducted with the greatest cave; was 

 done at night or very early in the morning, slowly e. a. Glidden, p. no. 

 and with frequent rests, so that the seals might 



not become overheated. Dining the killing the merchantable seals 

 were always carefully selected. No females were killed, except, per- 

 haps, one or two a season by accident, and the remainder of the herd 

 were allowed to return to the water or hauling grounds. Very few 

 seals were killed in a "drive," and the skins of these were, in nearly 

 every case, retained and counted in the quota allowed to be taken by 

 the lessees. The number of seals killed in this way could not possibly 

 have affected seal life on the island. I never saw or heard of a case 

 where a male seal was seriously injured by driving or redriving; and 

 I do not believe that the virility of males driven was destroyed by 

 climbing over the rocks or affected in any way by driving. Certainly 

 the reproductive powers of male lite on the islands were never de- 

 creased or impaired by these methods. 



Another fact in this connection is that the lessees located the killing 

 grounds as near the hauling grounds as seemed to be prudent without 

 disturbing the breeding of the rookeries; that boats and teams were 

 provided for transporting the skins to the salt houses from the killing 

 grounds, thus avoiding long "drives." 



The methods employed in handling the drives are the same identi- 

 cally as of twenty years ago. The same methods 

 were observed when I first went to the islands, w. s. Hereford, p. 36. 

 and were in vogue during the period that I re- 

 ferred to as an actual increase in seal life, and have been continued up 

 to the present times. There is nothing different, except the enormous 

 increase of vessels and hunters engaged in pelagic sealing in Bering 

 Sea. 



The killable seals, after being separated from the remainder of the 

 herd, are driven by the natives to the killing 

 grounds. After every "drive" that took place Louis Mmmel, p. 173. 

 while I was on the island 1 went back over the 



ground along which the seals had been driven to see if any seals had 

 been killed by overdriving. The entire number of seals killed in all 



