LOSS IF HERD DESTEOYED. 271 



imi)ortecl annually the sum of $490,000.^ When Loss to Uuited 



^ ^ ^ -^ ' states. 



to this is added the profits to the wholesale and 

 retail furriers and merchants engaged in the seal- 

 slvin industodes in the United States, which, accord- 

 ing to the American furriers quoted above, are 

 about $30 a skin, or on the 70,000 skins annually 

 imported $2,100,000/ the total amount received 

 each year in the United States from the man- 

 ufacture and sale of Alaska skins ao-o-rea-ates 

 $2,590,000. The average price per skin for 

 "Alaskas" in the London market for the last ten 

 years, when the lease to the Alaska Commercial 

 Company was in force (1880-1889) and when 

 100,000 seals were taken annually, was 685. ^d? 

 or (allowing 24.3 cents to the shilling) about 

 $16.50. The present lessees, under a norinal 

 condition of affairs, might expect a similar price. 

 In procuring the skins they pay the United 

 States $9.62i on each secured, and the $60,000 

 rent adds 60 cents more on each skin; allowing 

 $3 per skin for wages of employes, transporta- 

 tion, etc., the cost of a raw Alaska skin deliv- 

 ered in London would be about $13.25, which 

 selling at the average price of $16.50 would make 

 a profit to the lessees of the islands of $3.25 per 



1 statement of American industry by furriers, VoL II, p. 526. 

 « Tables of prices prepared by Mr. A. Eraser, Vol. II, p. 561. 



