224 COUNTER-CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



"driving" a most injurious feature in ]VIETH0DS 

 practised on pribyloff islands. 



The actual inetliod of taking- seals upon the Pribyloff 

 Islands is a subject which also rightly falls under the head 

 of the managenient of these breeding resorts of the seal. 

 If the skins of seals are to be obtained for the use of man, 

 the animals must be killed, arid the precise method of the 

 killing is a matter of comparatively small importance. 

 There is, liowever, one spe(*ial feature incident to the mode 

 of takiiig seals upon the ishinds wl-ich, from the loss occa- 

 sioned by it, has had a direct effect on the whole number 

 of seals, and has operated jjarticularly in the direction of 

 reducing the already too small number of virile male seals, 

 and in aggravating materially the result of a too liigh rate 

 of kilhng. This is the practice known as " driving." 

 Surrounded on the "hauling-grounds" — which so long as 

 the normal conditions prevail, and before the reduction in 

 numbers became serious, were at least theoretically sepa- 

 rate from the actual breeding rookeries — the seals are 

 driven overland to the killing places. A certaiji pro- 

 portion is then selected for killing; and the remainder, 

 consisting of males too youi!g or too old for profitable 

 killing, or of females accidentally gath.ered up from the 

 margins of the breeding rookeries proper, is allowed to 

 escape and to return to the water. 



ITS UNNATURAL AND DESTRUCTIVE CHARACTER. 



In explanation of the general results of tlie ])ractice of 

 driving animals for considerable distances overland, v,liich, 

 by their organization, are fitted for free and easy move- 

 ment in the sea alone, reference may be made to another 

 Sco pp. 101 «?])age, where the marine habits and mode of life of tlie iur- 

 seal are s^joken of, and where Sir William Flower, Profes- 

 sor Allen, and other {sulhorities are quoted in su]>port of 

 facts in connection with this, which have never, till in the 

 Case now ])resented by the United States, been questioned. 

 The specific evils which experience has proved to follov/ 

 from the X)ractice in questioi!, in the case of the fur-seal 



upon the Pribyloff Islands, may here be pointed out 

 26li by means of the recorded observations. Apart from 



the crueltj^ inherent in the mere process of driving 

 animals so organized, the actual eflects of the operation 

 have been found to show themselves in the death by the 

 way, from exhaustion, of driven animals: the impaired or 

 totally destroyed virility of the males thus frequently 

 driven, and the tlisturl)ance caused by such driving, lead- 

 ing to the avoidance of the breeding-islands, or to their 

 abandonment by large numbers of seals. 



EVIL EFFECTS INCREASED "WITH INCREASING SCARCITY 



OF KILLABLES. 



It will be understood that, Avhen large riumbers of young 

 "killable" males still existed upon tlie islands, the evils 

 meutioued were comparatively small, but \vith the jiicreas> 



seq 



