312 REPORT OF BRITISH COMMISSIONERS. 



7. Q. When you finally leave for Behring Sea, you drop a number of the Indians, 

 and only take about fourteen canoes with you? — A. Yes. 



8. Q. Do you prefer Indian crews to wliite men? — A. Yes, I do. 

 235 9. Q. What are your reasons for the preference? — A. Well, I get along bet- 



ter with them for one thing ; there is more honour among them than among 

 the average white crew in this business. They don't make an agreement to-day, and 

 break it to-morrow if they see a chance to make a little more. 



10. Q. And they don't quarrel among themselves? — A. No; and you can generally 

 trust them more. 



11. Q. They are more profitable, too, are they not? — A. Yes, a little more. 



12. Q. They furnish their own canoes? — A. Yes, and spears and boatmen ; audit 

 is not such a heavy outfit, but their canoes are light and easily broken by the heavy 

 seas. 



13. Q. They are better than aboard a large vessel? — A. Yes, but you have to be 

 very careful — the canoes are "dug-outs" and easily shattered. 



14. Q. Apart from getting along easier with the Indians, the experience is just 

 about the same as with the white crew? — A. Yes, the skins cost about the same in 

 the end. 



15-. Q. Do the Indian crews venture out during the stormy weather as much as the 

 white men? — A. Yes, almost as freely. I have had the same crew so long now that 

 they will do anything I wish them to do. 



16. Q. Do you take them down the coast? — A. Yes, and up the coast and on into 

 Behring Sea. 



17. Q. They spear all their seals? — A. The greater number of them, yes, but some- 

 times shoot; they spear all the "sleepers." 



18. Q. What proportion do you think they shoot? — A. They shoot probably twenty 

 out of the hundred; but I think now the fleet is getting so large there are more 

 wake seals, that consequently they did more shooting with me last year than ever 

 before. They never shoot a sleeping seal. 



19. Q. Do you think the seals are getting more shy on account of the larger fleet of 

 vessels? — A. Yes, they are much more shy. 



20. Q. Do the Indians approach the seals from leeward? — A. No; the Indian always 

 goes "across on the wind;" he pulls up almost in range of it, and goes across the 

 wind. They have a sort of idea that the seal sleeps with one eye open, hence the 

 way they approach. 



21. Q. When they heave the spear, tHe barb holds fast? — A. Yes; if they strike 

 the seal at all, they cannot lose it. 



22. Q. Therefore the percentage of seals killed by Indians and lost would be very 

 small ? — A. I would really count it nothing. If they did lose one by the spear pulling 

 out of the blubber it would not kill the seal, as it heals so quickly again. 



23. Q. The barb holds them, and they have no chance to sink? — A. Yes. 



24. Q. Therefore the percentage of loss is nothing? — A. I would not reckon it 

 anything. 



25. Q. The loss they make is only when firing at a travelling seal? — A. Yes. 



26. Q. And that loss would be by the animal escaping? — A. Yes. 



27. Q. You would not consider it lost, then? — A. No; if not hit in a vital part it 

 is not lost, for the Indian fires at a close range, and there are two in a boat, and 

 almost sure of it before the shot is fired, because they can't sink far before they are 

 right on to it. 



28. Q. So the percentage of the seals lost by Indian hunters, "sleeping" and not 

 "travelling," would be how much? — A. With Sleeping seals there is no loss. In 

 travelling seals there are none lost, only in escaping. Last year I saw a great num- 

 ber of seals brought in that had been shot before. 



29. Q. From personal knowledge and observation, you are satisfied that a flesh- 

 wound made in the seal would heal rapidly and not injure the seal? — A. Yes; theshot 

 seems to strike in the fatty parts or blubber, and does not seem to hurt the animal, 

 as it closes over and soon heals. 



30. Q. In the montlis of February, March, and April, have you seen a marked 

 number of female seals bearing young killed ? — A. Yes ; in winter there are a number. 



31. Q. Does that mean "barren" cows? — A. No; on the coast we get them "with 

 young." I have not seen many "' barren cows" out here in winter. 



32. Q. During the months of February, March, and April, what would you say 

 was the proportion of males to females? — A. I have only done one winter's sealing, 

 and that winter they would be fully one-half females during February and March. 



33. Q. That is, there would be as many females as bulls and grey pups? — A. Yea; 

 I have never seen a female grey pup on the coast. That is a yearling grey female 

 seal ; that is corroborated by the Indians. All the yearlings seen by me have been 

 males. 



34. Q. That is well known, you say, by the Indians? — A. Oh, yea. They remark 

 thig. 



