OPINIONS OF NATURALISTS. 491 



whether pelagic or at the islands, be strictly prohibited for a consid- 

 erable period. 



I have read with great interest your report and conclusions about 

 the causes of the decrease and the measures neces- 

 sary for the restoration and permanent preserva- l>>\ Carlos Berg, Vol. I, 

 tion of the seal herd on the Pribilof Islands in P- 433 * 

 Bering Sea, and according to your wish I have 



the pleasure to let you know that from the standpoint of a naturalist I 

 perfectly agree with you in considering your conclusions and recom- 

 mendations justified and necessitated by the facts stated by you as a 

 result of your si>ecial investigation on the above-named islands. 



By reason of the massacres of which it is the victim, this species is 

 advancing rapidly toward its total and final de- 

 struction, following the fatal road on which the ^r.RapJm^BUnchard, 

 Rhythm Stelleri, the Monachus tropicalis, and the 



Macrorhinus angustirostris have preceded it, to cite only the great 

 mammifers which but recently abounded in the American sens. 



Now, the irremediable destruction of an eminently useful animal 

 species, such as this one, is, to speak plainly, a crime of which we are 

 rendering ourselves guilty toward our descendants. To satisfy our 

 instincts of cupidity we voluntarily exhaust, and that forever, a source 

 of wealth which, properly regulated, ought, on the contrary, to con- 

 tribute to the prosj>erity of our own generation and of those which 

 will succeed it. 



When we live on our capital we can undoubtedly lead a gay and ex- 

 travagant life; but how long does this foolish extravagance last? And 

 what is its to-morrow ? Inextricable poverty. On the other hand, in caus- 

 ing our capital to be properly productive, we draw from it constantly 

 a splendid income, which does not, perhaps, give the large means 

 dreamed of, but at least assures an honorable competency, to which 

 the wise man knows how to accommodate himself. By prudent ven- 

 tures or by a well-regulated economy he can even increase progres- 

 sively his inheritance and leave to his children a greater fortune than 

 he had himself received from his parents. It is evidently the same 

 with the question which occupies us, and it is for our generation an 

 imperious duty to prevent the destruction of the fur-seal, to regulate 

 strictly its capture— in a word, to perpetuate this source of wealth and 

 to bequeath it to our descendants. 



It would be a very easy reply to your highly interesting treatise of 

 the fur-seal, which you have been kind enough to 



send us, when I only answered you that I agree with Prof.B. Collett, Vol. I, 

 you entirely in all points. No doubt it would be &• 421 - 

 the greatest value for the rookeries on the Pribilof 



Island, as well as for the preservation of the existence of the seal, if 

 it would be possible to stop the sealing at sea at all. But that will no 

 doubt be very difficult', when so many nations partake in the sealing, 

 and how that is to go about I can not know. My own countrymen are 

 killing every year many thousands of seals and cysto phorce on the ice 

 barrier between Spitsbergen and Greenland, but never females with 

 young; either are the old ones caught, or, and that is the greatest num- 

 ber, the young seals. But there is a close time, accepted by the differ- 

 ent nations, just to prohibit the killing of the females with young. 

 Perhaps a similar close time could be accepted in the Bering Sea, but 

 that is a question about which I can not have any opinion. 



