TAKEN IN SAN FRANCISCO. 493 



I found that at first the liniiters were disposed to brag of tlieir skill 

 and to overstiniate their success in securing- skins of seals shot at. The 

 reason for that was that an impression prevailed among- many of 

 them that! was about to engage in sealing enterprises, and that I was 

 making inquiries for the purpose of ascertaining their skill as hunters, 

 with the view to engaging them. 



The practice in British Columbia is to pay the best hunters the high- 

 est rate per skin. Men who could shoot fairly well, but ^^ ^^.^^^^ ^ 

 who used a shotgun, could be secured for a sealing ■^•^° 

 voyage from $1 to .tl.aO per skin, while hunters who shot with the rifle 

 and Avere of recognized skill in some instances were paid as high as 

 12.50 per skin, and generally speaking as high as $2 i)er skin. The 

 reason for this is obvious to those who have interested themselves in 

 the sealing business. A seal killed with buckshot is so much punc- 

 tured frequently that the pelt is of lesser value. It is not profitable 

 for schooners to engage as hunters men who miss their chances of 

 killing the seals and blaze away indiscriminately Avith small results. 

 Even though the hunter is only paid for the skin he recovers, the loss 

 to the vessel by his failure to kill when an opportunity offers is equiva- 

 lent to the profit it would have made on the skin if secured. For 

 these reasons and on account of the general proneness of men, who 

 consider themselves experts in the use of any weapon, 

 to brag, the seal hunters of British Columbia, as a thdr sllu.*'''''^^*'"^**' 

 class, grossly exaggerate the percentage of skins they 

 recover, to the number of seals aimed at, wounded, or killed. 



I have heard men say that they killed and recovered 90 per cent of 

 all the seals they fired at, but on examination of the accounts of the 

 schooners on which they had been employed previous voyages, I dis- 

 covered that more tlien ten rounds of ammunition had been used for 

 every skin that the vessel brought home. 



As a result of that investigation in the Bering Sea and North Pacific 

 and the investigations made subsequently, I discovered : 



First. That 95 per cent of all the seals killed in the „ , „ ,.„ 



^ . ,, ,.1 Waste of life. 



Bering Sea are temales. 



Second. That for every three sleeping seals killed or wounded in the 

 water only one is recovered. 



Third. For every six traveling seals killed or wounded in the water 

 only one is recovered. 



Fourth. That 95 per cent at least of all the female seals killed are 

 either in pup or have left their newly-born pup on the islands, while 

 they have gone out into the sea in search of food. 



The result is the same in either case. If the motlier is killed tlie pup 

 on shore will linger for a few days; some say as long as two or three 

 weeks, but will inevitably die before winter. All of 

 the schooners prefer to hunt around the banks where hu^uTth"fema^ie!'^ *** 

 the female seals are feeding to attempting to intercept 

 the male seals on their way to and from the hauling grounds. 



Aside from the greater diflticulty of killing and securing the skin of 

 a traveling seal, and the larger proportion of loss to the schooner, dur- 

 ing- the greater part of the sealing season, and more particularly in the 

 Bering Sea, there are few males to be found in the water. 



No other evidence of this is needed than the observation of the gen- 

 tlemen who spend the season on the Pribilof Islands and who all 

 agree in reporting that the male seals remain there, ^^j^^ ^.^^^^j^^ ^^ j^, 

 while the females, as soon as they are delivered of their lands during the saa- 

 young, go forth in search of food. The male seal sel- ^'"'- 



