THE FUR SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



357 



INCREASE OP THE SEAL-LIFE. I am free to say that it is not within the power of human man- 

 agement to promote this end to the slightest appreciable degree over its present extent and condi- 

 tion as it stands in the state of nature, heretofore described. It cannot fail to be evident, from my 

 detailed narration of the habits and life of the fur-seal on these islands during so large a part of 

 every year, that could man have the same supervision and control over this animal during the 

 whole season which he has at his command while they visit the land, he might cause them to multi- 

 ply and increase, as he would so many cattle, to an indefinite number only limited by time and 

 the means of feeding them. But the case in question, unfortunately, is one where the fur-seal is 

 taken, by demands for food, at least six months out of every year, far beyond the reach or even 

 cognizance of any man, where it is all this time exposed to many known powerful and destructive 

 natural enemies, and probably many others, equally so, unknown, which prey upon it, and, in 

 accordance with that well -recognized law of nature, keeps this seal-life at a certain number at a 

 figure which has been reached, for ages past, and will continue to be in the future, as far as they 

 now are their present maximum limit of increase, namely, between four and five million seals, in 

 round numbers. This law holds good everywhere throughout the animal kingdom, regulating and 

 preserving the equilibrium of life in the state of nature ; did it not hold good, these seal-islands 

 and all Bering Sea would have been literally covered, and have swarmed like the Medusce of the 

 waters, long before the Russians discovered them. But, according to the silent testimony of the 

 rookeries, which have been abandoned by the seals, and the noisy, emphatic assurance of those 

 now occupied to-day, there were no more seals when first seen here by human eyes in 1786 and 

 1787, than there are now in 1881, as far as all evidence goes. 



miles at sea, sweeping over a series of large fishing shoals which are located there, and in that reach of water hetween 

 Queen Charlotte Island and the month of Dixon Sound. Several small schooners, with native crews, and the Indians, 

 themselves, in their own canoes, cruise for them here during May and June of each year. How many they secure every 

 season is merely a matter of estimation, and therefore not a subject of definite anonuncement. In my judgment, after 

 carefully investigating the question at Victoria and Port Townsend in 1874, 1 believe, as an average, that these pelagic 

 far-sealers do not, altogether, secure five thousand animals annually. 



Those seals killed by the Aleuts of Manknshin and Borka settlements, above referred to, are all pups, and are used 

 at home none exported for trade. 



The last record which I can find of fur-seals being taken on land other than that of the Pribylov group of the 

 American side, is the following brief table of Techmainov, who, in 1863, published (in 2 volumes) a long recapitula- 

 tion of the Russian-American Company's labors in Alaska as illustrated by a voluminous series of personal letters by 

 the several agents of that company. Techmainov says that these fur-seals were taken on the Farrallones, which are 

 small islets just abreast the entrance to the Golden Gate, California. 



This period of 1824-1834 was the one passed by the Russians in their occupation of Ross or Bodega, California, 

 where a colony was engaged In raising cereals and beef, &c., for the stations in Alaska. I am inclined so think, how- 

 ever, that very likely many of the specimens of CalJorhinus counted in this table were shot or speared, as they now 

 are out at sea off the Straits of Fuca. The number is insignificant, but the pelts were not very valuable in those days, 

 and probably very slight exertions were made to get them ; or, otherwise, three thousand or five thousand annually 

 could have been secured at sea then, as they are to-day, by our people and the Indians of Cape Flattery. 



The record, however, of killing fur-seals on the Farallones, between 1806 and 1837, by the Russians, who were 

 established then at Bodega, California, is an honest one. I do not find any mention made of the fact that they bred 

 there, aud I am inclined to think they did not. I believe that when small squads of Callorhinus ursimis hauled out on 

 the California Islets, they did so lured by the large numbers of breeding ZalopTius, and the Eumetopias which repaired 

 there then, as they do now, for that purpose. Had the-sea-lions not been there, in the manner aforesaid, the presence 

 of fur-seals on North American land, elsewhere than on that of the Pribylov group, would not have been thus deter- 

 mined and established. 



Again, in this connection, and corroborative is the fact that in 1878 a few hundred fur-seals were taken by sea-lion 

 hunters among the ZalopJius at Santa Barbara and Guadaloupe Islands, southern Californian coast. I am assured of 

 this fact by the evidence of the gentleman who himself purchased the skins from the Incky hunters. None have ever 

 been seen there before by our people, and none have been taken since. The Russian archives give no testimony on 

 this score. 



