DECISIONS OF UNITED STATES COURTS. 115 



entered into a contract of lease, and by said contract did lease to the 

 Alaska Commercial Comi^any, a corporation duly established and in- 

 corporated under the laws of the State of California for the term of 

 tweuty years from the first day of May, 1870, the right to engage in 

 the business of taking fur seals on the islands of St. G-eorge and St, 

 Paul within the Territory of Alaska, and that j)ublic law implies an 

 obligation upon the United States to protect its lessees in the legiti- 

 mate use of the franchise conferred in said lease, and the capture of 

 the defendants with the vessels under their charge and control in the 

 waters and within the boundary lines set forth in this charge was law- 

 ful, and that it was lawful for the Secretary of the Treasury to direct 

 and order the seizure of such vessels, their masters, mates, and crews, 

 when found violating the law within the waters of Alaska. 



The admission of the defendants that they were killing fur-bearing 

 animals in that portion of Bering Sea which is within the boundary 

 line set forth in the treaty, as shown by the evidence, are to be taken 

 against them, and although such admissions are to be taken together 

 as a whole, the jury are not bound to regard all i^arts of them with equal 

 confidence; the fact that the admissions are against their interests or 

 in their favor, their improbability, inconsistency, contradictions, and 

 corroboration by other facts in proof are circumstances proper to be 

 considered by the jury in determining the weight to be given to such 

 admissions. And if the jury believe from the evidence that the defend- 

 ants or either of them were in charge of the schooner Thornton and had 

 in their employ men furnished with small boats and firearms or other 

 instruments or implements for the purpose of killing any of the fur- 

 bearing animals mentioned in the information, and that they admitted 

 they were engaged in that business, or when being accused they re- 

 mained silent, or if dead seals were found in their possession which had 

 recently been killed, the jury will be warranted in presuming that they 

 were killed under the direction and at the command of the defendants. 



District Court of Alaska. 



Opinion of Judge Dawson, Alaskan Reports, Vol. i, pp. 53 to 61, in the 

 case of "The British Schooner." Filed in the district court of 

 Alaska, October 11, 1887, in the cases of the Dolphin, Anna Bechy 

 Grace and Ada. 



Dawson, J. 



The libel of information in the case of the schooner Dolphin is similar 

 to the informations filed against the other schooners named, and alleges 

 that on the 12th day of July, 1887, the commanding officer of the United 

 States revenue cutter Rush seized the schooner Dolphin in that por- 

 tion of Bering Sea which was ceded to the United States by Russia in 

 the treaty of March, 1867. That said schooner was violating section 

 1956 of the Revised Statutes in relation to the protection of seal life in 

 the waters of Alaska. To the libel of information the Queen's coun- 

 sel of British Columbia filed a demurrer, alleging that the district 

 court of Alaska had no jurisdiction over the subject-matter of the 

 action, for the reason that the schooner was more than 1 marine league 

 from the shore when seized, and that the act of Congress of July 27, 

 1868, is unconstitutional, in that it restricts free navigation of the Bering 

 Sea for sealing purposes. A stipulation, signed by the Queen's conn- 



