ALASKA. 



45 



those engaged in this pursuit learned what the laws of nature 

 were in respect to the preservation of such a race of animals. 



They learned that they were highly polygamous in their nature, 

 and that a certain draft could be taken from the superfluous 

 males without sensibly depreciating the enormous numbers of 

 the herd. Learning those facts, they gradually established an 

 industry upon the islands, removed a considerable number of the 

 population of one or more of the Aleutian Islands, and kept them 

 permanently there for the purpose of guarding the seals upon the 

 islands and taking, at the time suitable for that purpose, such a 

 number of superfluous males as the knowledge they had acquired 

 taught them could be safely taken. 



Finally, the system which they established grew step by step 

 more regular and precise; and sometime — 1 think I may say in 

 the neighborhood of 1845 — ^^^7 ^-^^ adopted a regular system 



vhich absolutely forbade the slaughter of females and confined 

 the taking to young males under certain ages and to a certain 

 annual number. Under that reasonable system, conforming to 

 natural laws, the existence ot the herd was perpetuated and its 

 numbers even largely increased; so that at the time when it 

 passed into the possession of the United States, I think I may 

 say it was true that the numbers ot the herd were then equal 

 to, if not greater, than ever had been known since the islands 

 were first discovered. A similar system had been pursued by 

 the Russians with similar etfect upon the Commander Islands, 

 possessions of their own on the western side of the Bering Sea. 



The advantage of these results, so beneficial to Russia, so bene- 

 ficial to mankind, may be more easily perceived by comparing 

 them with the results which have flowed from the discovery of 

 other homes of the fur seal in other seas. It is well known that 

 south of the equator and near the southern extremity of the South 

 American continent, there were other islands, Masafuera, Juan 

 Fernandez, Falkland Islands, and other places w^here there were 



