242 THE SEALS. 



I know that as Ion g as I can remember the driving of seals has been 

 the most carefully done work on the island, and 



S. Melovidov, p. 145. all the drives have been done by our own people, 

 under the immediate orders of the native chiefs. 

 The aim at all times of all concerned has been to care for and guard 

 the seals, and to do everything possible to preserve and perpetuate 

 seal life. We were always instructed by the chiefs to drive slowly, and 

 to let the seals stop and rest occasionally, and if a cow happened to 

 join the drive, we had to allow her to drop out and return unmolested 

 to the water. 



It has been the policy and practice of the lessees to do everything 

 that could be done to shorten the length of the drives whenever it 

 could be done without injuring or disturbing the breeding rookeries, 

 and to this end salt houses have been built, teams and wagons or boats 

 used so as to reduce the longest drive on St. Paul Island to not to ex- 

 ceed 2 miles. Never since 1879 has a seal been driven on this island 

 to exceed that distance. In like manner rules have been made and 

 rigidly enforced that no hauling grounds shall be driven from oftener 

 than twice in any one week, and it is a rare thing to drive more than 

 once a week from the same place. 



„. , r , ., -, AC . There is no foundation in fact for the stories 

 Simeon Melovidov, p. 146. , ,, „ , . . ,. , 



told oi overdriving oi seals. 



The North rookery of Bering Island is in every way rougher than any 

 I observed on the Pribilof Islands. I saw two of 



N. B. Miller, p. 200. the drives from the North rookery. One of the 

 routes leads over the rough rookery, through the 

 shallow lagoon, and up the bluff at a place where the angle is about 35° 

 to the grassy plain in front of the temporary dwellings of the natives, 

 a distance in all of about a quarter of a mile; the other leads up the 

 bluff from the sand beach at the western arm of the rookery, out be- 

 yond and back ofthe settlement, over a comparatively level but marshy 

 and broken country, to a distance of from H to 2 miles. I consider 

 these drives harder and rougher than those of the Pribilof Islands. 

 The killing ground at the terminus ofthe shorter drive is small and did 

 not appear to be used to any extent. On June 4th, 1892, I landed on 

 and photographed Polatka rookery, on the western coast of Copper 

 Island. This is somewhat similar to the North rookery of Bering Island, 

 but is very much narrower, and instead of being composed of loose rock 

 heaps is largely of great tilted masses of stratified volcanic rock with 

 very sharp and jagged edges. It is less than a. mile long and at the 

 widest part, including the outlying rocks, not more than 300 yards in 

 width, measuring right up to the base of the bluffs. It lies at the foot 

 of abrupt cliffs from 600 to 800 feet in height along its whole length, with 

 the exception of one point. This is about the center of the rookery, 

 where there is a small hill of hard-packed sandy soil about 60 feet high, 

 back from which a very steep ascending ravine leads to the summit of 

 the ridge, an elevation of about 700 feet. 



The drive from Polatka rookery leads up over this sand hill and 

 through the ravine; over the ridge, I was informed, the rest of the 2 

 miles is on a descending grade to the other side of the island, where 

 the killing ground is located. The rocks of this rookery also did not 

 have the appearance of being flipper-worn. There were no signs of 

 vegetation on the entire rookery, and no soil apparently, except on the 

 sandy hill at the mouth of the ravine. I estimated about 250 fur seals 



