55 CHAPTER IV, 



Head (D). — The user of the Waters in question from 1821 to 1867. 



The Unitkd States Contentions. 



(1.) United States Case, p. 40 — 



"The Pribilofi" Islauds, the home of the Ahiskau seal herd, are situated less than 

 200 Italian miles from the Aleutian Chain on the south, and thus a sufficient 

 portion of the eastern half of Bering Sea was covered by the Ukase to enable 

 Russia to protect the herd while tliere." 

 (2.) United States Case, p. 57 — 



"The burden is thus placed upon Great Britain to sliow that this jurisdiction, 

 recognized in the year 1825 to exist, has been lost. It is not claimed that it was 

 exercised for all purposes. Russia never sought to prevent vessels from passing 

 through Bering Sea, in order to reach the Arctic Ocean ; nor did she always 

 strictly enforce the prohibition of whaling within the distance of 100 miles 

 from its shores; but, so far as the fur-seals are concerned, it will be made to 

 appear in what follows that the jurisdiction in question was always exercised 

 for their protection." 

 (3.) United States Case, p. 61 — 



"There is found positive conlirraatiou that by the treaties of 1824 and 1825 Russia 

 did not surrender her claim to exclusive control of trade, and especially of the 

 fur industry, in Bering Sea, in the fact that the same control over the waters of 

 that sea w^as enforced after the date of those treaties as before." 

 (4.) United States Case, p. 69— 



"Third. That after said treaty of 1825 the Russian Government continued to 

 exercise exclusive jurisdiction over the whole of Bering Sea up to the time of 

 the cession of Alaska to the United States, iu as far as was necessary to preserve 

 to the Russian-American Company the monopoly of the fur-seal indnstrj", and 

 to prohibit the taking on the land or iu tlie water by any other persons or com- 

 panies of the fur-seals resorting to the Pribiloft' Islands. 



"Fourth. That before and after the treaty of 1825, and up to the date of the ces- 

 sion of Alaska to the United States, British subjects and British vessels were 

 prohibited from entering Bering Sea to hunt fur-seals, and that it does not appear 

 that the British Government ever protested against the enforcement of this pro- 

 hibition." 

 (5.) United States Case, p. 73— 



"It has also been seen that the great source of wealth of the Russian-American 

 Company was the fur-seals of the Pribiloff Islands in Bering Sea, and that so 

 jealously was this source of wealth guiirded by the orders and authority of the 

 Imperial Government that foreign vessels were prohibited Irora hunting seals in 

 any part of Bering Sea, or in the passes of the Aleutian Islands; and that for the 

 enforcement of this prohibition cruizers were employed iu patrolling that sea so 

 long as it remained Russian territory." 



56 SuMMAUY OF British Reply. 



The burden cannot lie on Great Britain of proving that a jurisdiction never acquired 

 by Russia, or recognized by other nations, has lieeu lost. 



Russia showed no forbeai'ance iu not putting a stop to whaling. In 1846, her Foreign 

 Minister wrote: "We have no riglit to exclude foreign ships from that part of 

 the great ocean which separates tlie eastei'u shore of Siberia from the north- 

 western sliore of America." 



50 



