ORAL ARGUMENT OF JAMES C. CARTER, ESQ. 201 



it is perfectly manifest that the race can be exterminated by pelagic 

 sealing as well as by the sealing on land, because if it cannot stand 

 a draft of 100,000 males it most certainly cannot stand a draft of 

 50,000 females annually. It could not stand a draft of 5,000 females, 

 because the killing of the females operates upon the birth-rate and con- 

 sequently upon the increase. I think it will be demonstrable upon the 

 assumption favored by my learned friends on the other side that if it 

 Avill not stand a draft of 100,000 males it will not stand a draft of 

 10,000 females. The race may be exterminated therefore as well by 

 capture on the sea as by capture on the laud. 



Mr. Justice Harlan. What is the duration of life of these seals'? 



Mr. Garter. 1 take their productive life to be about eighteen years; 

 that is, the female seal, according to the Report of the American Com- 

 missioners. 



Mr. Justice Harlan. My recollection is that the average life of the 

 seal is about fifteen years. 



Mr. Garter. Now let me call the attention of the Tribunal to the 

 striking difference between dealing with a herd of fur-seals like these, 

 as regards keeping up their numbers, and dealing with polygamous 

 domestic animals of any sort, such as horses, cattle, or fowls. The lat- 

 ter can be raised all over the surface of the globe; there is hardly a 

 spot where they cannot be produced. If there is a great demand for 

 them in the market the production of these animals will be stimulated, 

 and there is immediately a saving of females, and the numbers killed 

 will be taken from the males. Gousequently, there is an immense 

 increase, and that increase can be carried on indefinitely. In refer- 

 ence to the females of domestic animals, there need be no rule against 

 killing females, because these animals can be multiplied to a perfectly 

 indefinite extent. With the seals, however, the case is far different. 

 There are only four places on the globe where this animal is produced, 

 and the demand for sealskins far exceeds the supply; and the object is 

 not only to preserve the present normal number, but to increase it. To 

 do this there is no way except by saving all the females. Every rea- 

 son and motive unite to condemn the slaughter of any single female 

 unless she be barren; for you cannot destroy one without diminishing 

 the race pro tanto. And, owing to the circumstance that there are 

 only four places on the globe where these useful animals can be pro- 

 duced, we must accept the conditions and content ourselves with them. 



Now, having shown the ditierence between these animals and do- 

 mestic animals of polygamous character, I will proceed to speak of the 

 difference between the seals and wild animals, such as birds of the air, 

 wild ducks, fishes of the sea, mackerel, herring and all those fishes 

 which constitute food for man and upon which he makes prodigious 

 attacks. 



There you cannot confine yourself to the annual increase. You do 

 not know it; you cannot separate it from the stock; you cannot tell 

 male from female, and you do not know whether there are any more 

 males than females. There is no reason why, in making drafts, you 

 should make them from males rather than females. Therefore you 

 cannot practise any kind of husbandry in reference to wild animals of 

 the description I have mentioned. That is one of the distinguishing 

 characteristics of these seals as compared with other animals over 

 which man has no control. With the seal, man, if he does his duty, 

 and accommodates himself to the law of nature, can practise a hus- 

 bandry and obtain the whole benefit which the animal is capable of 

 affording without diminishing the stock; but with other wild animals. 



