SEALSKIN INDUSTRY IN UNITED STATES. 539 



The amount of revenue derived by the Uidted States from the Ahiska 

 catch can be estimated from the following figures, care- ^^^ nue derived b 

 fully compiled by depouent, from 1872 to 1887, inclu- uuitlcrstates^from 



g jyg „ Alaska catch . 



The total number of skins dressed and dyed in London and shipped 

 to the United States during those sixteen years, was g^j^^^ dressed and 

 825,000. The value of the same was £3,253,941, which dvi-a in London knd 

 at exchange of $4.80 would produce $15,018,91(3; the Ss!'^ ^° ^"'*'"^ 

 duty upon which at 20 per cent ad valorem would be 

 $3,123,783. The average duty per annum is $195,230. The average 

 rental received by the Government and tax during these years from 

 the Alaska Commercial Company was $317,500, making a total aver- 

 age to the United States from the Alaska seal skins of $512,736; and 

 the total during the sixteen years above noted of $8,203,770, all of 

 which, as deponent believes, will be lost to the United States in the 

 future if the destruction is not prohibited. Deponent believes and says 

 that if unrestricted pelagic sealing be allowed to con- ji^^^i^^ of unre- 

 tinue throughout the whole of Bering Sea, not only atricted pelagic seai- 

 will tlie United States Government soon be deprived '"s- 

 of a considerable annual revenue, and over 2,000 English workmen of 

 skilled employment, of which they now have a practical monopoly, but 

 a portion of the civilized world will hereafter be deprived of a useful 

 and valuable fur-bearing animal; and a great and irreparable injury 

 will thus be done to various legitimate industries w^hich have been built 

 up by the authorized lessees of Russia and the United States and the 

 firm of C. M. Lampson & Co., which industries are confined to one lo- 

 cality and which if fostered promise to continue in existence for an in- 

 definite length of time; while in return for such injury there will be 

 only a comi^aratively slight benefit of a few years' duration to a com- 

 paratively small number of men. 



The deponent resided in the Hawaiian Islands for a period of twenty 

 years during the time his firm was engaged in whaling ^ur- . .^- ^ 

 and sealing as above stated; during that time he was ^^" ''"'■ 

 brought in contact with many masters of vessels and other seafaring 

 men, who made frequent voyages between the Hawaiian Islands and 

 Puget Sound, and he learned from them that during the months of No- 

 vember and December they occasionally encountered schools or "])ods" 

 of seals moving from north towards the lower coast of California; he 

 himself in one of his voyages in the month of November saw such 

 "pods;" and from these facts and his knowledge of the habits of the 

 seals which frequent and have their home on the Pribilof Islands, he is 

 satisfied that the herd of said islands confine their migration to the 

 waters of the American side of the ocean, and that when they leave 

 the islands they go through the passes of the Aleutian Islands to the 

 coast of southern California and thence along up the coast again to the 

 Pribilof Islands. 



The deponent was for more than ten years previous to the sale and 

 transfer of Alaska to the United States engaged in whale fishing in 

 the North Pacific and Arctic Oceans, employing quite a number of 

 vessels each year in that business; that these vessels „ ;. ^ ,.,, 



.,/ 1 -i ,T T-> • f■^ ' J. i. _£> 1 Sealing forbidden 



were permitted by the Itnssian Government to ireely by nussia in Bering 

 enter and pass through Bering Sea in pursuit of sea before i807. 

 whales, but it was known to the masters of the deponent's vessels that 

 the Russian Government did not i)ermit the taking of seals in any of 

 the waters of Bering Sea, and the deponent was informed by the 

 masters of his vessels and by others who resorted to Bering Sea dur- 



