SEAL LIFE ON THE PRIBILOF ISLANDS. 261 



Always shoot the seal close to the boat and rarely lose one; but when 

 shot at with the rifle I lose a good many. (Hooniah Dick.) 



I have always used spears in hunting seals, and seldom wounded or 

 hit one that 1 did not get until in 1801, which year, and the only one, 

 1 went to Bering Sea, and used the shotgun part of the time. I found 

 in the use of the shotgun that a great many of the seals that were 

 killed or wounded were lost. (Alfred Irving.) 



We lose but very few seals that we hit with a spear. (Selwish Johnson.) 

 When seals were struck with a spear none were lost; a great many 



are lost when the shotgun is used. (C. Klananeck.) 



I have often heard them say that they only get two or three out of a 

 school, and when they kill them, if they do not get them right away, 

 they will sink and be lost. Further, that they lose a good many that 

 they kill. (James Lafkin.) 



Q. Do you generally shoot seals with a rifle or shotgun? A. A shot- 

 gun. Ninety per cent are killed with a shotgun. (Frank Moreau.) 



Always use the shotgun for taking seals. I lose very few, as I always 

 shoot them close to the boat. (Matthew Morris.) 



I can not say how many seals are killed and wounded, but there is 

 no doubt that green hunters lose many, while those more experienced 

 in business lose fewer. (Morris Moss.) 



We used the spear more than the gun and secured nearly all of them 

 that we hit with it, but lost a great many seals that we shot. We pre- 

 fer to use the spear, because in so doing we do not lose so many or 

 frighten them away. (Osly.) 



The shotgun is not as fatal as the rifle, but it ruins the skins of the 

 seals. (Adolphus Sayers.) 



Breech-loading firearms (rifles and shotguns) are the instruments 

 principally employed by pelagic fur-seal hunters, both native and white. 

 By means of these weapons a greater number of skins are secured in a 

 season than w T heu spears are used; but the proportion of seals struck 

 and lost to those actually secured is much less than when the spear is 

 used. (John W. Smith.) 



The best hunter will fire about 20 cartridges, and they get 10 or 12 

 seals, while a hunter of less experience will fire 100 rounds and get 

 nothing, but will wound and disable them. (Adolph W. Thompson.) 



I have always used spears in hunting the seal, and seldom lose, any 

 I hit. (Charley White.) 



In attempting to determine the sex of seals killed in the Bering Sea 

 and the North Pacific, and of the number of seals killed in excess of 

 those actually secured by the hunters, I had interviews with upward 

 of fifty seal hunters, aside from interviews subsequently had with Indian 

 hunters. I find this portion of my work by far the most difficult. Much 

 discussion had already been had about the damaging effect of pelagic 

 sealing, and the hunters were loath to tell how many seals were killed 

 and not recovered, and were often averse to making truthful reports 

 about the sex of the animals killed, but by frequenting their haunts 

 and cultivating their company for long periods I succeeded in getting 

 accurate statements from a number of them. (Theo. T. Williams.) 



I found that at first the hunters were disposed to brag of their skill 



