NO. 4 COOPERATIVE WORK OF THE INSTITUTION II 



In 1896, Messrs. F. A. Lucas and Leonhard Stejneger, both of 

 the National Museum, were appointed members of the Fur-seal In- 

 vestigation Commission, which, under Dr. David S. Jordan as Com- 

 missioner in charge, was intrusted by the U. S. Treasury Department 

 with studying and reporting upon the whole fur-seal problem with 

 special reference to the effect of the award of the Paris Tribunal on 

 the rehabilitation of the seal herds and the regulation of pelagic seal- 

 ing. Mr. Lucas remained during the entire summer with the Com- 

 mission on the Pribilof Islands, taking the census of the rookeries, 

 studying the habits of the seals both on shore and at sea, investigat- 

 ing the problem of the abnormal mortality of the young, etc., while 

 Dr. Stejneger again proceeded in the Fish Commission S. S. Alba- 

 tross to the Commander Islands where he inspected the rookeries 

 and supplemented his observations of the previous year. From there 

 he continued in the Albatross to the Kuril Islands of Japan, in search 

 of seal rookeries which might possibly have escaped the destruction 

 inflicted upon them by raiders and pelagic sealers. He then pro- 

 ceeded to Robben Island, the Russian seal island, in the Okhotsk Sea, 

 oft' the east coast of Sakhalin, which was inspected, mapped, and 

 photographed. 



The Commission was continued during the season of 1897, but the 

 investigations were conducted that year under the auspices of the 

 Department of State, and in collaboration with a similar commission 

 from Great Britain. Messrs. Lucas and Stejneger were again de- 

 tailed and spent the season, the former investigating the Pribilof 

 herd, the latter the Commander Island seal industry. The results of 

 this cooperation was embodied in the four- volume report published in 

 1898-1899 by the U. S. Treasury Department under the title "The 

 Fur Seals and Fur-seal Islands of the North Pacific Ocean." 



As the seal protection treaty of 191 1 may become abrogated in 

 1925 if denounced 12 months before by any of the four contracting 

 powers, the Department of Commerce desired to obtain first-hand 

 information as to the status of the fur-seal herds of the Commander 

 Islands and Robben Island. In the spring of 1922, the Department 

 therefore requested the Museum to detail Dr. Stejneger for the pur- 

 pose of inspecting the North Pacific fur-seal rookeries. He was 

 consequently attached to the party accompanying Mr. C. H. Huston, 

 the Assistant Secretary of Commerce, on his tour of investigating 

 the fisheries of Alaska and far eastern Asia, which left Seattle, 

 Washington, on June 20, 1922, in the Coast Guard cutter Mojave. 

 During this cruise he visited the Pribilof Islands, the Commander 

 Islands, and Robben Island, returning to Washington by way of 



