258 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 



this generation nor the next will live to see its consummation. So with the sea 

 mammals of which we have spoken. If to-day legislation stepped forth with its 

 utmost power to protect, there will yet be years of unprofitable voyaging in the 

 northern seas before they once more become plentiful. The belated arrangements 

 relative to fur-seals in Bering Sea must be carefully carried out to insure any great 

 commercial advantage from them in the future. The seal, whale, and walrus produce 

 but one at a birth, the exception never being met in the seal, and if the others ever 

 bear more there are but two, and these events happen but once in a year. Therefore, 

 provided that a million seals are spared, and each cow is productive, the increase 

 could be at the very utmost but one to every ten animals, and this, allowing a great 

 percentage of the million to be females, the number of which never predominates to 

 so great an extent. 



It is plain, therefore, that the larger animals upon which whole populations have 

 depended for food and other life necessities, i. e., the three most valuable denizens of 

 the sea, must at once receive adequate protection or they will be destroyed beyond 

 remedy in a very short time. Cooperative international agreements are necessary 

 whereby the creatures will be safe from molestation, not only on their breeding- 

 grounds but wherever they gather. We maintain that they belong to the countries 

 upon whose territory they congregate for the purpose of carrying out nature's great 

 design, and that there each government should execute the utmost prerogatives to 

 secure safety for its property without any outside assistance, but only by peaceful 

 international legislation can deterioration and future extinction be avoided. By no 

 means do we mean to insure these animals alone from injudicious hunting, nor indeed 

 do we desire to express belief that they are the most important denizens of the water. 

 For only commensurate to their value to certain inhabitants can their true usefulness 

 be adjudicated, as likewise that of the salmon, cod, halibut, shad, herring or any 

 other fish equally important for commerce and for food. Except that the inhabitants 

 of the northeastern part of the United States, as also those of Nova Scotia, New- 

 foundland, etc., are within reasonable distance of inland towns, their dependence 

 upon the numbers and condition of the returns of their fishing fleets is almost as 

 great as that of the Esquimaux upon the seal, whale, and walrus hunting. 



If then those fisheries have become of national and international importance the 

 people of the eastern districts should have their fishing interests equally well guarded 

 from injury. Left to their own devices, the true fisherman one born to the trade 

 and relying upon its success will be careful not to injure his future prospects by 

 endeavoring to catch all the fish at one great sweep. Nor will he waste the other fish 

 that enter his net among the more valuable kinds. Instead, he will cast the flapping, 

 gasping, wide-eyed strangers back into the <water, there to perform their part in tho 

 world of nature. Therefore, it is not among the life hunters and fishermen that we 

 must look for the destroyers of the fish or mammals, but to men or companies who 

 take spasmodic interest in them for a. time, simply as a money-making scheme. The 

 protection and propagation of the more desirable food-fishes seem to have become 

 established sufficiently to remedy many of the evils heretofore existing, but trouble 

 still exists and will continue so long as indiscriminate catching is permitted. 



The reasons for this are obvious. Some years ago there was a company (or com- 

 panies) formed called the " Menhaden Fisheries," ostensibly for taking menhaden, a 

 comparatively useless fish, whose reputation was to be redeemed by making oil and 



