FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 



83 



portion of the seal- visited ai'ea at this 

 spot. ' " * For the reasons cited ill a 

 similar example at Zapadnie, no hollns- 

 chickie have beeii driven from this point 

 since 1872, though it is one of the easiest 

 worked. It was in the Russian times a 

 pet sealing ground with them. 



^ July 14, 1874. 



The vast numbers of the holluscliickie 



on this ground of Polavina, where they 



have not been disturbed for some five 



years, to mention in the way of taking, 



novastoshnah. 



July 2, 1872. 

 It was a view of such multitudes of 

 amphibians, when I first stood upon the 

 summit of Hutchinson's Hill and looked 

 at the immense spread around me, that 

 suggested to my mind a doubt whether 

 the accurate investigation which I was 

 making would give me courage to main- 

 tain the truth in regard to the subject. 

 Hutchinson's Hill is the foundation of 

 this point, which is itself a solid basaltic 

 floor, upon which a mass of breccia has 

 been poured at its northwest corner. It is 

 rough, very rough, in spots, and smoother 

 in other places ; but everywhere indicated 

 on my chart it has been polished clean 

 and clear of every spear of grass or trace 

 of moss. The hill is about 120 feet high, 

 and has a rounded summit, over which, 

 and swarming up and down over its flanks 

 to the west and the east is an astonishing 

 aggregate of young male seals or hollus- 

 chickie. Theseherds, taken together with 

 the 3i miles of unbroken rookery belt of 

 solid massed life in reproduction, make 

 a truly amazing sight this afternnon — 

 amazing in its aggregate and infinite in 

 its vast detail. 



July 16, 1872. 

 Webster gets all the hoUuschickie that 

 he wants from one sj)ot on the north shore 

 of the sand-neck beach, west of the foot 



of tlu^ earth itself witliin those lines, from 

 your sight at liecjueut intervals, and never 

 let you see more than a scattered glimpse 

 of it at any one place or time; then, six- 

 te'en years later, to stand again there, as 

 I stood to-day, and look again upon that 

 same phice and the assembled life, and 

 then to see nothing there but a few lonely 

 j>ods of sheep, and they all timidly hud- 

 dled down at one margin of this pasture, 

 and so few in number that it required 

 really no efiort for you to count them one 

 by one — that is precisely the way this 

 rookery and this hauling ground look to 

 me to-day. 



June 25, 1890. 

 The poverty of these celebrated haul- 

 ing grounds of Polavina is well illustrated 

 by the catch from the drive to-day (263 

 skins). At this time in 1872 I could have 

 driven from the great parade plateau be- 

 hind these breeding grounds, under pre- 

 cisely the same circumstances surround- 

 ing the drive to-day, 10,0(10 killable seals ! 

 not one over 4 years old, and very few 

 under 3 years old. Comment is needless. 



July 2, 1890. 

 Now, to-day, every good 2-year-old, 

 every 3 and 4 year old was knocked down 

 here, out of this 1,930 animals, to get 240 

 skins. Where at this rate is the new blood 

 for the rookeries to come in, now so des- 

 perately needed « * * » 



novastoshnah. 



Junk 15, 1890. 

 Arrived at Webster's House at 12.30 

 p. m. * * * The two natives sta- 

 tioned here on w-atch declared that yester- 

 day, which was a fine day, was employed 

 by them in making a circuit of the point; 

 that they carefully inspected the rookery 

 margin and found only about 300 hoUus- 

 chickie hauled immediately up on the 

 north side of the sealions on the neck. 

 Peter Peshenkov declared that nowhere 

 else was there any hoUuschickie; that 

 there were a few polseacatchie on the 

 beach just below the south shoulder, and 

 nothing in the line of killable seals, 

 except under the north slope of Hutchin- 

 son's Hill, about 200 good ones. 



July 13, 1890. 

 Fowler had over 5,000 seals driven up 

 this morning, and wlieu he had finished 

 the killing he had only 473 skins. All the 

 rest too small ; chiefly last year's pups. 

 Then in the afternoon, rain coming up, 

 he made a rapid drive of those hoUus- 

 chickie Avhich he had been saving for 

 to-morrow, fearing that the rain would 

 send them into the sea, and secured 168 

 more, making a total of 641, being the 

 extreme limit reached in any one day's 

 killing up here this year, and a total of 

 4,135 only. On this day here last year 

 Webster had killed 17,168 seals. Fowler 



