SEALSKIN INDUSTRY IN UNITED STATES. 525 



killed on the Pribilof Islauds by the companies having leases from the 

 United States for that purpose. A certain number of skins bought by 

 deponent's firm are those killed upon the Eussian, called the Com- 

 mander Islands, known as the Copper catch, and 

 about 30 per cent of the whole number of seal skins (.ateh!*^"^"'* ^'"''* 

 bought by deponent's firm are what are called the 

 Northwest Coast skins; the skins of animals killed and caught in the 

 open sea. 



Third. That the skins of each of the several catches are readily dis- 

 tinguishable from each other by any person at all experienced in the 

 handling of seal skins; and the skins of the Northwest, Alaska, or 

 Copper catch, are none of them found except under those titles, that is 

 to say, that skins of the "Coi)per " catch are not found among the "Alas- 

 ka" seal skins, uor those of the Northwest catch among 

 the Alaska or Copper seal skins. The skins of the three distTnguishabfe'! '^' ' ''*' 

 catches are so readily distinguishable from each other 

 that dei)onent says he would be able, on the examination of the skins 

 as they are taken from the barrels in which they are packed in salt and 

 received by him, to detect at once in a barrel of Alaska skins, the skins 

 of either the Copper or the Northwest catch; or in a barrel of the North- 

 west catch the skins of either the Alaska or the Copper catch, or in a barrel 

 of the Copper catch the skins of either the Alaska or Northwest catch. 

 The skins of the Alaska and Copper catches are readily distinguishable 

 from each other, although male skins ; and the slcins of the Northwest 

 catch are- also readily distinguishable from both the 

 Copper and Alaska by the fact that they are almost niS^Eies. "^^''^ 

 all females, and all have marks of bullets, buckshot, 

 or spears, showing that they have been killed at sea, although the 

 Northwest catch belong to the Pribilof Island herd. 



Fourth. That the skins of the Northwest catch are, dei)onent would 

 say, at least nine-tenths of them, skins of female seals. 

 The skins of the female seals are as readily distinguish- ^fill^*'^ p"'" *"""* ^^^ 

 able, before being dressed and dyed, from the skins 

 of male seals as the skin of a bitch and the skin of a dog, or the skin 

 of any other female animal from that of the male of the same family. 

 The females always have narrower heads than the males, and the 

 breavSts aftbrd another ready means of identification of female seals. 



Fifth. It is equally true that the skins of all the other catches which 

 we had in prior years were readily distinguishable from each other. I 

 have not seen the seals in their native rookeries, and can not speak as 

 to the distinguishing traits of the live animal, but in the trade and in the 

 experience of our firm we have always been able to distinguish readily 

 ^he skins coming from one locality from the skins coming from another. 



remember upon one occasion my firm received a consignment of skins 

 Irom London which bore no marks familiar to us and which skins had 

 fnot been described to us, and that my brother, who was then at the 

 head of the business, and who is now dead, said, after inspecting the 

 said skins, that they reminded him very much of what were formerly 

 called " south latitude skins," and particularly of some skins which he 

 had had twenty odd years before from Santa Barbara, in California; 

 and upon inquiry from the Messrs. Lampson and Company, we were 

 informed by them that the said skins were the skins of seals killed at 

 Santa Barbara. 



Henry Treadwell. 



Subscribed and sworn to before me this first day of April, 1892. 



[seal.] WlLLARD PAKKER BuTLER, 



Notary Public^ City and County of New York, 



