FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 167 



coiiclusiou that it was, and is one of the several steam whalers that are 

 known to be cruising in Bering Sea this season, 



Peter Peshenkov, one of these, watchmen, said that yesterday was a 

 fine day, still, and semicleai-. He went around the entire circuit of the 

 rookery, carefully insi)ecting the sea margin. He says that he found 

 about L*(iO hoUuschickie hauled immediately up ou the north side of 

 Sea Lion ^STeck. He says that nowhere else was there any hoUuschickie, 

 except a few polseecatchie ou the beach just below the south shoulder: 

 and, everywhere else, outside of the straggling old bulls, nothing. 

 Peter anclCarp Booterin came into the house during the afternoon while 

 the storm was in i)rogress, and talked to Mr. Golf and myself freely 

 over the condition of this rookery, as well as the others. 



June J()j 1890. — Webster House, 9 a. m. Carp Booterin and Neon 

 Mandriggan made a circuit of Northeast Point this morning. They 

 report to Mr. Goft" no sign of vessel landing or sealing anywhere on the 

 circuit. They say that there are about 300 hoUuschickie on the Staff 

 Bight: about 200 good ones on the north slope of Hutchinson Hill, and 

 a few, very few, at or near the South Shoulder. I came down on foot 

 to the village, giving Polavina a survey along outside, so as to see the 

 old and new seal grass on that famous parade. It is somewhat too 

 soon to arrive at a conclusion: but what I saw, and noted, causes 

 surprise. 



Suppose you had, sixteen years ago, stood on an eminence overlook- 

 ing a sheep ])asture three-fourths of a mile in length and one-fourth to 

 one-half a mile in width: this lot tilled with a flock of sheep so full as 

 to fairlv whiten with their bodies the whole surface of the green earth 

 upon which they slept, grazed, and stood in groui)s. Then to day to 

 stand again upon the same eminence, overlooking the same ground and 

 life, and see nothing but a few lonely, wide-scattered bands of siieep, 

 and these so few in nu!id)er that it requires no eftbrt to count tliem one 

 by one. That desolate impression made thus upon you, is precisely the 

 impression that these hauling grounds of St. Paul Island make ui)on 

 me to day. Perhaps the next month may improve matters, but Mr. 

 Gofif says that it will not. 



June 17, 1890. — I made a review of the abandoned site of Nah Speel 

 rookery this morning. The last bulls and cows hauled here in 188G. 

 In 1872-1874 there were some 8,000 bulls, cows, and pui)shere, with 400 

 feet of sea margin, 40 feet deei). In 1876 they had fallen off to less 

 than half that number, having gone over across the way to Lagoon 

 rookery. 



This abandonment gives me a good basis for an estimation of the time 

 it takes for nature to remove the traces of seals hauling on the rocks. 

 These rocks of Nah Si^eel rookery, under my feet this morning, were in 

 1872-1874, so polished by the tlipi)ers of Callorhinns that nothing save 

 the shiny basalt, olivine, and gray lava was to be seen ; to-day, they are 

 literally covered with yellow and gray lichens: and, were it not for the 

 evidence of those seal-grass tussocks up above them, a practiced eye 

 would not, could not, susi)ect the previous existence of a breeding rook- 

 ery on them. And this all effaced in less than twelve years, partially 

 by the lapse of the first six, then wholly within the last five years. How 

 important it is, theref<n-e, to have these breeding grounds correctly 

 surveyed at frequent intervals: so that ebb or flow of this seal-life tide 

 can be truthfully registered. Certain it is, nothing can be definitely 

 trusted to memory in this respect. 



Jvne 17j 1890. — On the Peef and Garbotch. Where are the polsee- 

 catchie. or half Jndh? Where, indeed, are those young 5 and (5 year 

 old bulls which were literally swarming at the water's edge of these 



