FUR-SEAL HEED OF ALASKA. 



193 



the many prolilems connected with its 

 management and effective conservation. 



Within the hist 25 years nearly a score 

 of the most distinguished naturalists, not 

 only of this country, but of Great Britain, 

 Canada, and Japan, have visited our seal 

 islands for the specific purpose of study- 

 ing the habits of the fur seals and the 

 problems connected with the proper 

 management of the herd. Among these 

 gentlemen I may mention the following 

 ( reading) : 



"Dr." Barton Warren Evermann, in 

 charge of the Alaska llsheries service, 

 who, as special fur-seal commissioner in 

 1892, spent six months on our seal islands 

 in the North Pacific and on the Russian 

 seal islands, studying the fur-seal rook- 

 eries, hauling grounds, and migrations. 



"Mr. Joseph Stanley-Brown, of New 

 York, spent the seasons of 1891, ]892, 

 1894. 1895. 189fi, 1897. and 1899 on the 

 seal islands, where, as naturalist and 

 keen business man, he made very thor- 

 ough study and investigations not only 

 of the habits of the seals l)\it very valua- 

 ble study of the economic questions 

 involved." 



Evermann attempts to misstate 

 the Russian record of killing: 



Dr. Evermann. They took a great 

 number of these seals during the closed 

 season from 1835 to 1846? 



Mr. Elliott. Yes; "gray pups,'' all 

 males, in November, annually, and it 

 didn't destroy them either. It would be 

 a good thing to follow that to-day. 



Dr. Evermann. On page 65. line 1, you 

 say: 



■'Way back as far as 1826 the Russians 

 themselves recognized the fact that they 

 were culling the herds too closely — that 

 they were ruining the business by the 

 land killing of all tlie choice males; they 

 knew that they alone on the islands were 

 to blame, because no such thing as hunt- 

 ing fur seals in the water by white men 

 then was dreamed of, much less done." 



Do you seriously claim that it was the 

 killing of males that reduced the herd? 



Mr. Elliott. I claim that the Russian 

 agents so reported. 



Dr. Evermann. Do you claim it did? 



Mr. Elliott. Certainly I do. 



Dr. Evermann. Do you not know that 

 up to at least 1835 female seals were reg- 

 ularly killed by the Russians? 



Mr. Elliott. No. I know you injected 

 it into a report of another committee of 

 this House, and the c-hairman of the com- 

 mittee apologized for the misinformation 

 he got from you. I'm glad you asked me 

 that question. (Hearing No. 10, p. 616, 

 April 24, 1912. House Committee on Ex- 



North American Commercial <'o., by 

 order of Mr. J. Stanley-Brown, and Assist- 

 ant Agent Murray was ordered to count 

 the seals. 



Wednesday, June 6, 1894- 

 Steamer Lakme. of the North American 

 Commercial Co. arrived, having on 

 board * * * ilr. Brown, superin- 

 tendent of the North American Commer- 

 cial Co. 



Elliott submits to the commit- 

 tee the facts in re method of Rus- 

 sian killing: 



Mr. Elliott. Way back as far as 1826 

 the Russians themselves recognized the 

 fact that they were culling the herds too 

 closely — that they were ruining the busi- 

 by the land killing of all the choice males; 

 they knew that they alone on the 

 islands were to blame, because no such 

 thing as hunting fur seals in the water by 

 white men then was dreamed of, much 

 less done. 



In December, 1820, Gen. Tanovsky, 

 the imperial Russian agent, sent over to 

 Sitka from St. Petersburg in 1818, to exam- 

 ine into the question of that decline of the 

 fur-seal catch, then wrote to his Govern- 

 ment that "so severe is this practice of" 

 culling the best males for slaughter, " that 

 if any of the young breeders are not killed 

 by autumn, they were sure to be killed 

 by the following spring," and urged the 

 reformation of this work then on the 

 islands. 



Here is this evil of overdriving and cull- 

 ing the herd presented and defined 50 

 years before I saw it, and nearly 70 years 

 before Jordan denies its existence in 1898. 

 Think of it — we have sent two investigat- 

 ing commissions since 1890 up to our 

 ruined fur-seal preserves on the Pribilof 

 Islands, one in 1891 and the other in 

 1896-7, and yet, in spite of this plain Rus- 

 sian record and my detailed and unan- 

 swerable indictment of that particular 

 abuse in 1890, these commissioners 



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