REPORT OF BRITISH COMMISSIONERS. 143 



" grey pups" to 17 dollars for best skins. The number of skins ftot in 

 various years depends of course on the abundance of seals and the 

 character of the weather; but there is also a great difference from year 

 to year in the number oi' hunters, governed by the prices of skins, and 

 the wages ofl'ered for other work. Probably, about 200 skins are taken 

 each year at present by these Indians, but as these are bought by vari- 

 ous traders, it is difficult to get exact figures. • 



549. A spear or hook about twenty feet iu length is often used to 

 recover the seal when shot, and the Indian hunters questioned stated 

 that they had never lost a seal when killed. 



550. The Kitkatla tribe of the Tshimsians, whose jiermanent village 

 is situated on Goschen Island, are noted as fur-seal hunters, though, 

 because of the facility in obtaining employment with regular wages, in 

 late years they have not paid so much attention to this hunting as 

 before. They resort to Bonilla Island in the seal-hunting season, and 

 in 1891 there were there seventy hunters with their families. The num- 

 ber of skins obtained this year was, however, small, as most of the 

 hunters suffered from the influenza epidemic. Generally speaking, 

 about 300 skins are taken in spring and early summer. 



551. These people hunt iu Hecate Strait, and their mode of hunting 

 is the same as tha' practised by fehe Tshimsians proper. A few of the 

 Kitkatlas have been employed on sealing- schooners for the past four 

 or five years, but no large numbers from any of the Tshimsian group 

 of tribes engage in this species of hunting. Mr. E. Cunningham, who 

 has been for twenty-five years familiar with the Indians of this tribe, 

 states that the seals do not usually sink at once unless the breath 

 escapes from the body. 



552. Hailzuh. — The Hailzuk tribes, of the vicinity of Milbank Sound, 

 resort chiefly to the outlying group, named the Goose Islands, at the 

 seal-hunting season in spring. A number of these Indians, includ- 

 ing several well-known seal-hunters, were interviewed at Bella-Bella. 

 They stated that in ancient times the fur seal was killed by their fore- 

 fathers only for food. Sea otters were abundant, and the skin of the 

 seal was not of much value. When a fur-seal was killed, it was kept 

 only if fat. The flesh is sometimes eaten still, but not so much as 

 formerly, though the fat is always kept for food. The best part of the 

 seal for food is the flipper. Before guns were in common use, the spear 

 was employed exclusively in the pursuit of the sea-otter and fur-seal, 

 but now one hunter only still continues to use the spear. They began 

 hunting fur-seals as a business about twenty years ago — not so long- 

 ago as twenty-five years, which they remembered because of the small- 

 pox. Guns are now employed, loaded with buckshot, or with three 

 trade bullets. They hunt only iu their own canoes, with two to four 

 men in each canoe; and in these they sometimes go so far from land 

 that only the mountains about Cape Calvert remain iu sight. Occa- 

 sionally they spend a night at sea. 



552*. The seal is sometimes shot from a distance of not more 



95 than 20 feet, when sleeping, but often at much greater distances. 



It is taken into the canoe with the hand, or, if beginning to 



sink, a spear or gaff is used. Males sink more frequently than females. 



553. These people were unable to state any definite projiortion as 

 between the seals recovered and those lost by them, but they are not 

 accounted very skilful hunters. The largest number taken by a single 

 canoe in one day in 1891 was eight, and in this case two that were 

 killed Avere lost in addition. About 300 fur-seal skins in all were 

 obtained by the Bella-Bella people alone in 1891, which was a good 



