78 MANAGEMENT. 



The number of age to the whole number killed on St. Paul 



seals taken from 



Northeast Point. Island. From this table it appears that in 1873 

 26,369 seals. were taken, being- 34.9 per cent of 

 the whole number; in 1874, 34,526, or 37.5 per 

 cent; in 1875, 35,113, or 39 per cent; in 1888, 

 33,381, or 39.7 per cent; and in 1889, 28,794, or 

 33.9 per cent. The average percentage for the 

 nineteen years during which the lease may be 

 said to have been in operation (some 3,400 only 

 having been taken the first year under the same) 

 is 31.4. The Commissioners give the number 

 taken in 1889 as 15,076, claiming the same to be 

 from official records, but the citation given is to 

 a report to the House of Representatives printed 

 in 1876 (Sec. 677). Evidently this is a clerical 

 error, but it deprives the United States of the 

 opportunity to examine the authority intended 

 to be cited. 

 to A resfrved r 2eIs Tne question of driving in 1879 from areas, 

 in 1879. before reserved and untouched, is used in the 



Report to show that the male seals had decreased 

 to such an extent as to compel the resort to these 

 hauling grounds. The Commissioners refer to 

 this in the following words: " Whatever may 

 have been the detailed history of the seal inter- 

 ests on St. Paul in the intervening years, the 

 fact that in 1879 it became necessary for the first 

 time to extend the area of driving, so as to in- 



