318 REPORTS OF BERING SEA COMMISSION. 



Article IX inter- to allow its consequeiicGs to be thouglit out, 



preted differently -, -, ^ i i i i t • /-n • • 



by British Com- coulcl DG reacnecl by the Joint Commission 



missioners, 



unless we were willing to surrender absolutely 

 our opinions as to the effect of pelagic sealing 

 on the life of the seal herd, which oj^inions were 

 founded upon a careful and impartial study of 

 the whole question, involving the results of our 

 own observations and those of many others, 

 to^ppficati^r*'^^ Under such circumstances the only course 

 open to us was to decline to accede to any prop- 

 osition which failed to offer a reasonable chance 

 for the preservation and protection of seal life, 

 or which, although apparently looking in the 

 right direction, was, by reason of the vagueness 

 and ambiguity of its terms, incapable of def- 

 inite interpretation and generally uncertain as to 

 Report of Joint nieanino-. In obedience to the req uirements of 



Comuiiasiou. & i 



the Arbitration Convention that "the four Com- 

 missioners shall, so far as they may be able to 

 agree, make a joint report to each of the two 

 Governments," the final output of the Joint 

 Commission assumed the form of the joint report 

 submitted on March 4, it being found impossible 

 in the end for the Commissioners to agree upon 

 more than a single general proposition relating 

 to the decadence of seal life on the Pribilof 

 Necessity of a Islands. It therefore becomes necessaiy, in 



Heparate report. 



accordance with the further provision of said 



