REPORT OF BRITISH COMMISSIONERS. 227 



one at the Piiiis Museum, and found to be identical. It was the lirst tiuie that the 

 southern fur-seal {Arctocephalus ciiiereiis) had been seen in Enghuid. Representationa 

 were made to the New South Wales Government some few years back tlnit this seal 

 was rapidly becoming extinct. The GoverniLent issued an order protecting them on 

 the islands and the mainland of New South Wnles, flie result being that they are 

 now on the increase, and a number may be seen inhabiting the Seal Rocks a little to 

 the north of Port Stephens. 



In New South Wales the sealing trade was in full swing from 1810 to 1820, the 

 linns engaged being Sydney firms, viz., Messrs. Cable, Lord, Underwood; Riley, 

 Jones, and liirnie; Hook and Campbell. These firms had crafts manned by crews 

 of from twenty to twenty-eight men to each vessel, and were usually fitted out for 

 a twelve months' cruize. 



Owing to the want of proper restrictions, the indiscriminate slaughter was terri- 

 ble. It is recorded that in the years 1814-1.5, 400,000 skins from one island, the 

 Antipodes Island, or, as it is sometimes called, Pennatipod, were taken. These 

 skins being obtained in such a hasty manner were but imperfectly cured, and a 

 writer states that the ship "Pegasus" took homo 100,000 of these in bulk, and on 

 her arrival in London the skins, having heated during the voyage, had to be dug- 

 out of the hold, and were sold for manure. 



As early as 1801-2 Peron says he found British seamen in Bass Straits killing all 

 that came in their way. In tne years 1803 and 1804 upwards of 3(),000 skins were 

 sent from the islands in Bass Straits, the slaughter being made without regard to sex. 



At the present time in Macquarie Island are only to be foun^l the sea-elephant 

 (MoriDH/a eJephantina), yet when Macquarie Island was discovered by a eealer in 

 1811, the sealing master who discovered it procured a cargo of 80,000 skins, antf 

 another sealing party 100,000 skins, in one year. 



With such a reckless killing, it is no wonder that the seals have become scarce 

 round our shores, and unless steps are immediately taken, it will only be a question 

 of time when their extermination will be comi)leted. 



Along t*he shores of New Zealand, as well as the southern shores of Australia, 

 large numbers of seals were found. In New Zealand a vessel from Boston, called 

 the "General Gates," landed a party of six men near the south-west cape of the 

 Middle Island on the 10th August, 1821. In six weeks the party got 3,563 skins. 

 For about twenty years enormous numbers were captured without any respect to 

 age or sex, and in the year 1839 only a straggling seal was occasionally seen along 

 the shores of New Zealand. 



The American fur-seal had a narrow escape of sharing the fate of its southern 

 kindred. In a paper dealing with this subject, a writer gives the following account : 



"Early in this century tlie seals were almost exterminated in many of the islands 

 in the North Pacific, and were there as ruthlessly slaughtered as they were in the 

 Bass Straits and the New Zealand coast. The extermination was, as it were, com- 

 menced, had not Russia first and the United States afterwards leased the exclusive 

 right of killing seals on the Pribyloff Islands — a famous sealing place — to a single 

 Company, by which means the seals were saved, as the Company had an interest in 

 kee])ing up the supply of furs." 



This single experiment, the writer states, has proved conclusively that fur-seals 

 can be farmed as easily as sheep, and that sealing should not be thrown open with- 

 out restrictions. Seals are a property the State should jealously guard. On the two 

 Pribylott" Islands it is computed that 500,000 .seals resort annually. These islands, 

 from the value of the fur-seal, were discovered in the year 1786, when the slaughter 

 commenced, and was prosecuted without [ ? ] until the year 1839, when the num- 

 ber had been so reduced that the business threatened to be entirely destroyed within 

 a few years. The destruction was then stopped until 1845, when it was gradnalij^ 

 resumed, though, instead of the indiscriminate slaughter which had before been per- 

 mitted, only the young males (2 years old) were allowed to be killed. The rookeries 

 continued to increase in size until 1857. 



The Company who leased the right ef sealing in these islands were restricted about 

 the year 1860 to 50,000 seal-skins annually. From 1821 to 1839, 758,502 fur-seals were 

 killed, and 372,894 from 1845 to 1862. From another authority, Mr. Hittell, I find 

 that when the United States Government took possession of the islands in 1867 sev- 

 eral American firms took possession, and the wholesale slaughter of seals began 

 afresh. In 1868 not less than 200,000 seals were killed, and for 1869 it is said the 

 number was not far below 300,000. The United States Government, fearing their 

 total extinction, leased the sole right of seal-fishing on these islan«ls to one firm, 

 restricting the allowed number to 100,000. From what he had been able to lay before 

 the Fisheries Board, no tiuie should be lost in at once taking steps to protect the 

 seal fisheries in IJass Straits. Wherever projier restriction has been introduced a 

 most valuable industry has been started in connection with the seal industry, and, 

 instead of the three years, as has been proposed by this Board, he strongly recom- 

 mended five years for the close season, and if at that time the seals have increased 



