AN ALLEGED CAUSE OF DECREASE. 73 



condition. An examination of the Russian docu- . .^ ll 1 e ? um M* a 



killed from 1800- 



ments herewith submitted shows that from I860 1860, 

 to 1865, inclusive (when it may be assumed the 

 rookeries had recovered from the mortality of 

 1836 and the slaughter of female seals prior to 

 1847), the annual quota ranged from 45,000 to 

 70,000 on St. Paul Island alone, and that the 

 only reason why more were not taken was the 

 plethoric condition of the Chinese, Russian, and 

 American markets. 1 



The other class of statements or conclusions Second division 



of evidence. 



advanced, to show that the breeding and non- 

 breeding seals decreased during the ten years 

 following the leasing of the Pribilof Islands in 

 1870, may be divided into three heads, namely, 

 (1) an alleged increased proportion of females to 

 breeding males, (2) an alleged recognition by 

 the lessees of the decrease of male seals, and 

 (3) alleged overdriving and resort to new areas 

 to obtain the quota. The first allegation is Comparisons of 



, , . , . harems 1870 and 



based entirely on comparisons between the early 1890 irrelevant, 

 years of the lease of 1870 and the last two or 

 three years of the same (1889-1891). The 

 United States insist that such comparisons aro 

 irrelevant, for, even if the breeding males were 

 disproportionately few during the latter years, it 



1 Posl pp. 193-199. Bancroft's Alaska, p. 582: "In 1851, 30,000 

 conld be killed annually at St. Paul Island alone, and in 1861 as 

 many as 70,000, without fear of exhausting the supply." 



