TESTIMONY TAKEN AMONG THE MAKAH INDIANS. 



Deposition o/Boiva-chup, Malcali Indian, scaler. 



pelagic sealing. 



State of Washington, 



County of Clallam, ss: 

 Bowa-cliup, being duly sworn, deposes and says : I am a native Makah 

 Indian, and reside on the reservation at Seah Bay, State of Wash- 

 ington, United States of America, and am about 40 years of age. 

 I have been engaged in seal-hunting ever since I was a boy. Until 

 about ten or twelve years ago I used to seal along the coast in 

 large canoes from 10 to 18 miles from Cape Flattery and in the 

 Straits of San Juan de Fuca. At first I was a paddler, and after- 

 wards I became a si)earman. In those days there were a great many 

 seals in the water, and tliey would go in bands of 15 or 20 together. 

 About five or six years ago L commenced to hunt in smaller canoes that 

 were taken out to sea in schooners. I hunted with spears all of the 

 time. I have never killed any full-grown cows on the coast that did 

 not have pups in them, and I have hunted all the way from the Colum- 

 bia Eiver to Barclay Sound. I do not know of any place along the 

 coast where seals haul out upon the land, nor have I ever heard of such 

 a place, and I have never killed any full-grown cows 



young in the water nor on the kelp; if they did they 

 would be drowned and die. 



I was in the Bering Sea in 1889 on the schooner James G. Sn^an, but 



did not use shotguns. Most all the seals we caught 



James G. swan,im. ^^^^^^ ^^^^^ giving milk, and I havc never been there 



-,3^,"fTr'^f "1°^^ ** since. All the seals along the coast go to the Pribvlov 



1 ribiiof Islands. isi^^ds to brccd. The cows leave here in June and the 



and'jui*'*'^^*'"*'^""^ yearlings sometime in the middle of July. Seals were 



" ^' very plenty in the straits and around the cape until 



about six years ago, when the white hunters came in schooners and 



with shotguns and commenced to kill them all off, and now there is none 



Decrease "^ ^^^ straits, and we can not get but one or two where 



Ave used to get eight or ten. They are very shy and 



wild and are decreasing very rapidly. A good many of the seals that 



I have caught in the last three or four years have shot in them, and 



some have been badly wounded. I have seen white hunters shooting 



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