124 REPORT OF BRITISH COMMISSIONERS. 



453. The inquiries and observations now made, however, enable it to 

 be shown that tlie fur-seals of the two sides of the Nortli Pacitle belono- 

 in the main to practically distinct niij>ration-tracts, both of which aie 

 elsewhere traced out and described, and it is believed that while to a 

 certain extent transfers of individual seals or of small j^^roujis occur, 

 jirobably every year, between the Pribyloft" and Conmiander tribes, that 

 this is exceptional rather than normal. It is not believed that any 

 voluntary or systematic movement of fur-seals takes place from one 

 group of breeding- islands to the other, but it is probable that a con- 

 tinued harassing of the seals ur)on one group might result in a course 

 of years in a corresponding gradual accession to the other group. 



454. There is no evidence whatever to show that any considerable 

 branch of the seal tribe which has its winter home off the coast of 

 British Columbia resorts in summer to the Commander Islands, whether 

 voluntarily or led thither in pursuit of food-tishes, and inquiries along 

 the Aleutian chain show that no regular migration route follows its 

 direction, whether to the north or south of the islands. It is certain 

 that the young seals in going southward from the Pribyloff Islands 

 only rarely get diifted as far to the westward as the 17i!nd meridian of 

 west longitude, while Attn Island, on the 173rd meridian east, is never 

 visited by young seals, and therefore lies between the regular autumn 

 migration-routes of the seals going from the Pribyloff and Commander 

 Islands respectively. 



455. The price obtained for sldns from the Commander Islands has 

 generally been somewhat lower than that for the Pribyloff skins, but 

 this is believed to result rather from the less careful handling and 

 preparation of the Commander Island skins than from any inherent 

 inferiority. Under this belief, the Alaska Commercial Company at one 

 time, in 1876, sent Mr. D. Webster, their most experienced foreman, to 

 the Commander Islands, to introduce better modes of treating the skins 

 there. M. Grebnitsky, however, states that there is some actual general 

 difference in the skins, such as to enable them to be distinguished by 

 an ex])ert, and that he is informed that the Commander Island skins are 

 more difficult to "unhair" in dressing, Snegik^ft", the Aleut foreman 

 in charge of the Behring Island rookeries, who liad also been on the 

 Pribyloff Islands for some years, stated that \ie had observed that in 

 both sexes the seals on the Pribyloff' Islands were somewhat shorter 

 and stouter than on the Commander Islands, and that the Pribyloff 



seals have thicker fur and shorter hair on the belly. This he 

 81 attributed to the circumstance that the seals stay longer ashore 



on the Pribyloff Islands. He said further, that on the Com- 

 mander Islands the females are larger, and the mature males, or "sea- 

 catchie," often become nearly white about the manes with age. He 

 added that on Robben Island, in Okotsk Sea, the seals have still longer 

 and thicker hair than on the Commander Islands. 



450. As there is a considerable range of individualdiversity, particu- 

 larly in colouration, among the seals of any single locality, it would 

 require much longer and more detailed exaniinaiicui than we ourselves 

 were able to make, to verify these statements; but it ap])ears to be 

 probable that there is actually a slight general varietal ditlerence as 

 between the tribes frequenting the two i)rincipal groups of breeding 

 islands, whether this is due to causes such as those above referred to 

 or other circumstances. The amount of interconnection between the 

 two groups is doubtless, however, sufficient to prevent any very strik- 

 ing or permanent peculiarities even of a varietal rank to grow up. 



