184 TESTIMONY RELATING TO ST. GEORGE ISLAND. 



dustry in all of its details as it is pursued ux)on the Pribilof Islands, and 



it is but natural tliat I should become dee])ly interested in the subject 



^ ., X ,non of seal life. My experience has been practical rather 



Growth up to 1880. ,i ,, j.- i r i j-i t i i i 



than theoretical. 1 have seen the herds grow and mul- 

 tiply under careful management until their numbers were millions, as 



was the case in 1880. From 1884 to 1891 I saw their 

 to"^s9r'^^° ^™™ ^^^* numbers decline, under the same careful management, 



until in the latter year there was not more than one- 

 fourth of their numbers coming to the Islands. In my judgment there 



is but one cause for that decline and the present con- 

 pekSc^S^rrione^ ditiou of the rookcries, and that is the shotgun and 



rifle of the pelagic hunter, and it is my opinion that if 



the lessees had not taken a seal on the Islands for the last ten years we 



would still find the breeding grounds in about the same condition as 



they are to-day, so destructive to seal life are the methods adopted by 



wa,teofiife thcsc liuuters. I believe the number they secure is 



small as compared with the number they destroy. Were 

 it males only that they killed the damage would be temporary, but it is 

 mostly females that they kill in the open waters, and it is plain to any- 

 one familiar with this animal that extermination must soon follow un- 

 less some restrictive measures are adopted without delay. 

 N. B. — The foregoing is substantially the same statement that I 

 statement to the J^ade to the Commissioners who visited the islands in 



commissioners in 1891. 1891. 



Daniel Webster. 



Subscribed and sworn to before me, an officer empowered to admin- 

 ister oaths under section 1976, Eevised Statutes of the United States, 

 on this the 11th day of June, 1892, at St. George Island, Alaska. 



Wm. H. Williams, 

 Treasury Agent in charge of Sfol Islands. 



