I TESTIMONY 



to take when left to tliemselves. The practice of driving has always 

 been conducted the same as when I was on the islands, and the seals 

 ton have thriven and increased under it. They grow much 

 ornes ica ion. tauicr, too, with repeated driving, and seem to learn 

 the road and Avhat is expected of them on the killing ground. It is 

 much less trouble to handle a drove of seals from the rookery very 

 near the village than those from a distant i)oint. They grow very 

 tame when reared near where people are passing and repassing, and 

 none of them are as wild or show as much fear as sheep ordinarily do 

 when approached by man. 



The large bachelor seals arrive on the islands from the 1st to the 15th 



of June each year, sleek and fat as they can be, while 



Arrival of bachelors. ^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^^j^ .^^ September are very thin in llesh, or 



in about the same condition as the bull seals then are, which, it is well 

 known, do not leave the rookeries for some four months. On the other 

 hand, the yearlings and two-year-olds remain in good condition the en- 

 tire season, and must, I think, go off to the feeding grounds occasion- 

 ally during the summer. The females go and come 



Females feeding. ^^^^^ ^j^^, ^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ islauds. I 



have seen rookeries, and particularly tlie one on the reef, plainly in 

 sight from St. Paul village, swarming with pups and comparatively few 

 mothers in sight, and it has sometimes remained so for twenty or thirty 

 hours at a time, convincing me that they must have gone a consider- 

 able distance from the islands for food. Up to 1884 there were never 

 enough dead pujjs on the rookeries to cause any re- 

 Dead pups. mark. Occasionally one would be trampled to death 

 by the fighting bulls, but the loss was almost nothing until the marine 

 hunters began their work, and it grew to be quite noticeable before I 

 left the islands. It was easy enough to see what they died of. They 

 simply starved to death, wandering about and bleating until it made 

 one's heart ache to see them. Their mothers had been killed off in the 

 water, and the pups lived and suffered for weeks. They are very tena- 

 cious of life, holding out six or eight weeks or more after they lose their 

 mothers. 

 I am asked whether the seals copulate in the water. It is a ques- 

 . . ^ tion that is often discussed at the islands, and neither 

 Copulation m watei. ^^^ scientific obscTVcrs uor the unscientific are able to 

 agree about it. I have seen seals in position when it seemed to be at- 

 tempted, but doubt whether it is effectually accomplished. If it were, 

 I think we should see pups sometimes bom late and out of season, but 

 sueh is not the case. 

 I believe there has been a great decrease of seals on the islands since 

 I left there, and this is no doubt due to pelagic hunt- 

 ing. The extermination of the animals and of the in- 

 dustry will be swift and sure unless the female seals are protected from 

 Protection ^^^ devastation now going on, and I do not believe it 

 possible to protect them as they should be unless the 

 North Pacific as Avell as Bering Sea is included in any measures adopted 

 to this end. 



John Armstrong. 



Subscribed and sworn to before me this 10th day of May, A. D. 1892. 

 [seal.] Clement Bennett, 



Notary Fublic. 



