TAKEN AT VICTORIA, BRITISH COLUMBIA. 34? 



In 1889 I went as boat-steerer on the British schooner ^^^^ ^^^^ 

 Ariel, Capt. iiiickuam, master. She had six boats and 

 four canoes. Carried both white and Indian hunters. White hunters 

 used shotguns and rifles. Indians used spears chiefly. We left Victo- 

 ria in February and sealed over about the same course as the year 

 before and entered the Bering Sea in July. We took 

 about 500 skins before entering the sea and caught ^nt^^-edBenngbea. 

 about ] ,600 more around the southwest banks, from 30 to 75 miles from 

 St. Paul Island. We were ordered out of the sea about q^^^^^^ ^^^ 

 the 1st of September by the revenue-cutter Bush. 



In 1890 I did not go sealing. 



In 1891 1 sailed as boat-steerer in the British schooner jr,n&rma i89i 

 Z7m&rwa, Captain Campbell, master. She carried seven 

 boats and had white hunters, who used shotguns and rifles. Left Vic- 

 toria in March and sealed along the coast. I left her ggauno- off coast 

 before she went into the sea. Her whole season's 

 catch was about 900, but do not know what portion of them she caught 

 before entering Bering Sea. This year I went as boat-steerer in the 

 British steamer Thistle. She had six sealing boats and 

 two whaling boats, and carried white hunters, with shot- 

 guns and rifles. She left Victoria in February and sealed off the Oali- 

 lornia coast. I left her in March. She had only 79 



, . Sealing on coast. 



skins. 



My experience in four years sealing is that nearly all 

 the seals taken along the coast are pregnant females, femafesf ^" ^'"^^"'"'* 

 and it is seldom that one of them is caught that has 

 not a young pup in her. In the forepart of the season the pup is small, 

 but in May and June, when they are taken off the Queen Charlotte 

 and Kodiac Islands the unborn pup is quite large, and we frequently 

 take them out of the mothers alive. I have kept some of them alive 

 for six weeks that were cut out of their mothers, by feeding them con- 

 densed milk. The seals we captured in Bering Sea 

 were fully 80 per cent females that had given birth to femffif p^"" *'^°' 

 their young. A fact that I often noticed was that their 

 teats would be full of milk when I skinned them, and I have seen them 

 killed from 20 to 100 miles from the seal islands. We 

 try to kill the seal while sleeping on the water, but also fr^^siands" ™'^®^ 

 shoot at them when they are breaching. 



An ordinary hunter will lose about four out of every six he kills. 

 Some do not do near as well, while others do better, ^asteofiif 

 The percentage of loss to those killed is less on the 

 ct)ast than it is in the Bering Sea, for the seals are more fat and do not 

 sink as quick, but a great many are wounded and lost. The Indians, 

 when they use the spears, lose but very few. They get up close to the 

 sleeper and scarcely ever miss getting it. I know of ^^ ^^^ ^^^ ^^ 

 no place on the coast where seals come up to land, and coast. 

 I am positive there is none. Seals are not near as 

 plentiful as when I went out in 1888, and I believe the Decrease, 

 decrease is due to their being hunted so much with 

 shotguns and rifles. 



Edwen p. Porter. 



Subscribed and sworn to before me on this 22d day of April, A. D. 

 1892. 

 [SBAL.I Levi W. Myers, 



United States Consul. 



