TRE FUR-SEAL ISLANDS OF ALASKA. 7 



The Georgia islands and the Sandwich group, all a succession of rocky islands and reefs awash — the South 

 O.kuejs, the Shetlands, the Auckland group, Campbell's island, Emerald island, and a few islets lying just to the 

 southward of iS^ew Zealand— have all been places of lively and continued butchery; the fur-seals ranging in 

 desperation from one of those places to the other as the seasons progressed, and the merciless search and slaughter 

 continued. These pinnipeds, however, never went to the southward of 62° south latitude. 



In considering the western Antarctic hemisphere, I must not forget also to mention, that the fur-seal was in 

 early times found up the east coast of South America, here and there iu little rookeries, as far north as cape St. 

 Eoque; but the number was unimportant, when brought into contrast with that belonging to those localities which 

 I have designated. A small clift'bouud rookery to-day exists at cape Corientes. This is owned and farmed out 

 by the Argentine republic, and we are informed that in spite of all their care and attention they have neither 

 increased nor have they diminished from their original insigniticauce; from this rookery only three to five thousand 

 were and are annually taken. It appears as if the fur seals had originally passed to Bering sea from the p'lrent 

 stock of the Patagonia region, up along the coast of South America, a few tarrying at the dry aud heated Galapagos 

 islands, the rest speeding on to the northward, disturbed by the clear skies and sandy beaches of the Mexican 

 coast, on and up to the great lisli-spawQing shores of the Aleutian islands and Bering sea. There, on the Pribylov 

 g?oup aud the bluffy Commander islands, they found that uuion of cool water, well-adapted lauding, and njpist, 

 foggy air which they had missed since they left the storm-beaten coasts far below. 



Iu the Antarctic waters of the eastern hemisphere seals were found at Tristan da Cunha, principally on Little 

 Nightingale island, to the southward of it; on Gough's island; on Bouvet's island; Prince Edward and Marion 

 islands ; the Crozette gxoup, all small rocks, as it were, over which violent storms fairly swept ; then we observe 

 the great rookeries of Kerguelen land, or Desolation island — where perhaps nine-tenths of all the oriental 

 fur-seals congregated — thence over to a small aud insignificant islet known as the Hoj-al Company, south of Good 

 Hope. This list includes all the kuown resting-places of the fur-seal iu those waters. 



FOEMEE ABtTNDANCE IN THE SOUTHEEN HEMISPHEEE : EXTENT OF EXTEB3IINATIONS. — In the light Of the 



foregoing remarks, is it not natural, when we reflect upon the immense area aud the exceedingly favored conditions 

 of ground and climate frequented by the fur-seals of the Southern ocean, to say that their number must have been 

 infiuitely greater as they were first apprehended, surpassing all adequate description, when compared to those 

 which we now regard as the marvel and wonder of the age — the breeding rookeries of the Pribylov group ? 



It is a great pity that tliis work of extermination and senseless destruction should have progressed as it has 

 to the very verge of total extinction, ere any one was qualified to take note of and record the wonderful life 

 thus eliminated. The Falkland islands and Kerguelen land, at least, might have been placed under the same 

 restrictious and wholesome direction which the Russians established in the North seas, the benefits of which accrue 

 to us to-day, aud will forever, as matters are now conducted. Certainly it is surprising that the business thought, 

 the hardheaded sense, of those early English navigators, should uot have been equal to that of the Eussian 

 Promyshleniks, who were renowned as the most unscrupulous and the greediest of gain-getters. 



Possibilities foe protection. — The Falkland islands offer natural conditions of protection by land far 

 superior to those found on the Pribylov or Commander groups. They have beautiful harbors, and they lie in the 

 track of commerce, advantages which are not shared by our islands; at Desolation island, perhaps, the difficulties 

 are insuperable on account of the great extent of coast, which is practically inaccessible to men and nearly so to 

 the seals; but the Falkland islands might have been farmed out by the British government at a trifling outlay and 

 ■with exceeding good result; for, millions upon millions of the fur-seals could rest there to-day, as they did a hundred 

 years ago, and be there tomorrow, as our seals do and are in Bering sea. But the work is done. There is nothing 

 down there, now, valuable enough to rouse the interest of any government; still, a beginning might be made, which 

 possibly forty or fifty years hence would rehabilitate the scourged and desolated breeding-grounds of the South seas. 

 We are selfish people, however, and look only to the present, and it is, without question, more than likely that 

 should any such proposition be bfought before the British parliament it would be so ridiculed and exaggerated by 

 demagogues and ignorant jesters as to cause its speedy supi)ression ; hence, in our opinion, it is not at all likely 

 that the English government, or any of the other governments controlling these many islands of the Southern 

 ocean, which we have named, will ever take a single step in the right direction, as far as the encouragement of the 

 fur-seal to live and i)rosper in those regions is concerned. When we look at our northern waters we speedily 

 recognize the fact, that between North America and Europe, across the Atlantic and into the Ai'ctic, there is not a 

 single island or islet or stretch of coast that the fur-seal could successfully struggle for existence on. These facts 

 will become entirely clear wheu the chapter on the habit of this animal is reached. 



Isolation of the Noeth Pacific eookekies. — In the North Pacific, in prehistoric times, a legend from 

 Spanish authority states, that fur-seals were tolerably abundant on the Santa Barbara and Guadaloupe islands, off 

 the coast of California, and the peninsula to the southward. A few were annually taken from these islands, up to 1835 

 and some were wont to sport on those celebrated rocks off the harbor of San Francisco, known as the Farraloues; 

 ut no tradition locates a seal-rookery anywhere else on the northwest coast, or anywhere else in all Alaska aud its 

 islands, save the Pribylov group: while across and down the Asiatic coast, only the Commander islands and a little 



