REPORT UPON THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE FUR-SEAL 

 ROOKERIES OF THE PRIBILOV ISLANDS OF ALASKA. 



By Henry W. Elliott, 



Special A(jent, Treasury Department. 



Clevkland, Ohio, November 77, 1890. 



Sir : On tlie Ttli of last April I received from your liauds my appoint- 

 ment as the special agent under an act of Congress, ap])roved April 5, 

 1890, wliicli orders and provides for a tliorougli examination into the 

 present status of the fur-seal industry of our Government as embodied 

 on the seal islands of Alaska, so as to make known its relative condi- 

 tion now as compared with its prior form and well being in ISTii, and 

 for other kindred lines of inquiry. 



I may as well fiankly confess at the outset that I was wholly unaware 

 of the extraordinary state of affairs which stared me in the face at the 

 moment of my first landing last vspring on the seal islands of Alaska. 

 I embarked upon this mission with only a faint apprehension of view- 

 ing anything more than a decided diminution of the Pribilov rookeries, 

 caused by pelagic sealing during the last five or six years. 



But, from the moment of my landing at St. Paul Island, on the 21st 

 of last May, until the close of the breeding season, those famous rook- 

 eries and hauling grounds of the fur seal thereon, and of St. Grcorge 

 Island, too, began to declare and have declared to my astonished senses 

 the fact that their utter ruin and extermination is only a question of a 

 few short years from date, unless prompt and thorough measures of 

 relief and protection are at once ordered at sea and on land by the 

 Treasury Department, and enforced by it. 



Quickly realizing after my arrival upon these islands that a remark- 

 able change for the worse had taken [»lace since my finished work of 

 1874 was given to the jmblic in that same year, and the year also of 

 my last survey of those rookeries, I took the field at once, carrying 

 hourly and daily with me a series of notebooks opened under the fol- 

 lowing heads: 



I. Tlie "rookeries," their area, position, and condition in 1872-1874, 

 and 1890. 



II. The "hauling grounds," their appearance in 1872-1874 and 1890. 



III. The method of "driving," and taking fur seals in 1872-1874, 

 and 1890. 



IV. The selection of skins, grade, and supply in 1872-1874 and 1890. 

 V^. Character, condition, and number of natives in 1872-1874 and 



1890. 



VI. Conduct of native labor and pay in 1872-1874 and 1890. ' 



To these heads I add the following sections, the whole series making 

 u}) my report in the order as they are here given: 



VII. Tlie protection and preservation of these fur-bearing interests 



