202 ORAL ARGUMENT OF JAMES C. CARTER, ESQ. 



such as ducks, fislies, wild game, &c., lie can practise no such hus- 

 bandry at all. 



And here it will be observed how Nature seems to take notice of the 

 impotence of man and lurnishes means of perpetuating the si)ecies of 

 the wild animals last mentioned. In the first place, slie makes ])ro- 

 vision for the production of prodigious numbers. Take tlic herring, the 

 mackerel, the cod ; they do not produce one only at a birth, but a million ! 

 They produce enough, not only to supply all the wants of man, but the 

 wants of other races of fishes that feed ui)on them. They inhabit the 

 illimitable regions of the sea; their sources of food are illimitable, and 

 their pioductive powers are illimitable also, and therefore man can 

 make such drafts u])on them as he pleases without working any de- 

 struction of them. There is another mode designed by nature for their 

 preservation, and that is the facility which she gives them to escape 

 capture. Man lays hold of some of them which come within his range, 

 but the great body of them never come there. With the seals it is 

 otherwise. They have no defence. They are obliged to spend five 

 months of the year on the land where man can slaughter them ; and 

 even at sea they cannot escajjc him, as the evidence clearly proves. 

 The distinction between the seals and the dome.-tic polygamous ani- 

 mals and other wild animals is extremely im})ortant and worthy of 

 careful observation because of its bearing upon this question of 

 property. 



Marquis Yisconti-Venosta. Do you know any other animals beside 

 the seal that are situate in like conditions? 



Mr. Carter. None under precisely the same conditions. I hear my 

 learned friend whisi>er "sea-otter''; but you cannot practise any sort 

 of husbandry with the sea-otter. It never i)laces itself like the seal 

 under the power of man. And yet, snch is the value of the sea otter, 

 that man has almost exterminated that animal, notwithstanding its 

 facilities for escape. 



The President. They are not protected. 



Mr. Carter. They are nominally protected by the laws of the United 

 States; they are a part of the wealth of the Northern Sea. They were 

 formerly the principal element of value in those northern seas; and the 

 value attached to the skin of this animal was very great even when it 

 was found in larger numbers. 



The President. You will not put the sea-otter on the same legal 

 footing as you do the fur-seal ? 



Mr. Carter. No. So far as I am aware, man has no sure means of 

 preserving the sea-otter, for it seems to me that he has exterminated 

 it almost altogether. Then take the case of the canvas-back duck, a 

 bird Avhich abounded in America. As long as man made but a slight 

 attack upon its numbers — fifty years ago, when there were no railroads 

 and when the means of transporting it were quite imperfect — this bird 

 was found in great plenty, but the abundance was confined to the local- 

 ity where it was found. But now it can be transported five thousand 

 miles without injury, and the whole world makes an attack upon it. 

 The law may protect it a little, but it cannot protect it altogether from 

 the cupidity of man; and this creature, too, is fast disappearing. 



In other words, these birds have all the characteristics of wild ani- 

 mals, and none of the characteristics of tame animals. You cannot 

 practice any husbandry in regard to them. No man and no nation can 

 say to the rest of the world that he has a mode of dealing with them 

 which will enable him to take the annual increase without destroying 

 the stock. I shall make use of that hereafter: and you see now the 



