662 APPENDIX TO COUNTER-CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



Declaration of GaiHam Albert C Folger. 



Dominion of Canada, 



Province of British Columhia, Git)/ of Victoria, 



I, Captain Albert C. Folger, at present of the city of Victoria, in the 

 Province of British Columbia, do solemnly declare as follows : 



1. I am a citizen of the United States of America. 



2. TLis is the first season for nineteen years that I have not been out, 

 either sealing or otter-hunting. 



3. I was first six years sea-otter hunting, sailing from San Francisco. 

 We did not kill many seals then, as they were not of nuich value at 

 that time. 



4. In 1882 I went to Japan, and ever since then have been seal-hunt- 

 ing, not otter-hunting at all. We sailed from Yokohama, followed the 

 seals right up to the Commander Islands. At that time we used only 

 rifles, but we then could shoot as well with rifles as hunters now do 

 with shot-guns; we learned to use the rifle well when otter-hunting for 

 seasons. I sailed for the Liebes firm of San Francisco, and it was that 

 firm that sent me to Japan; they had two vessels sailing from Yoko- 

 hama, supposed to be sea-otter hunting, but they were sealing. This 

 firm has since claimed that they never had vessels sealing, but I know 

 that they took seals, not only in the water, but on the shore as well. I 

 would not like to say where. v 



5. In 1882 there was a fleet of thirteen schooners sealing on the Japan 

 coast; they were mostly under different flags. A good many of them 

 were seized by the Eussians under the charge of raiding, but the charge 

 could not be proved, and one of them was not near the islands at all; 

 five were seized, I think. The "Helena," one of the vessels, was seized 

 when 16 miles from the Siberian coast; no redress was ever got. 



C. Besides the rookeries on the Commander Islands and Eobben 

 Eeef I know of hauling-out places — not rookeries — one place was a lit- 

 tle island called Eacoky, right in the middle of the Kurile group. Ves- 

 sels went there every year sea-otter and sea-lion hunting, and no seals 

 had ever been seen there, but in 1886, when on the "Penelope," Cap- 

 tain Miner, we were surprised to find thousands of seals hauled out 

 there. I had been at this place for the three previous seasons — there 

 must have been 12,000 or 15,000 seals — among them 700 or 800 pups. 

 We took 4,000 skins, and had not salt to cure more. The story got 

 about in Yokohama, and an owner of a schooner in Yokohama tele- 

 graphed Hakodate to a captain there of the schooner "Diana," and that 

 vessel went to the island and got about 1,500 skins. We went there 

 the next year; the whole fleet agreed that we would not go there until 

 July so as to give the seals a chance to come ashore, but one captain 

 went then, and not knowing the habit of the seals, began to kill them 

 as they came ashore; he soon had them frightened, and none would 

 land; that fall I came over to this side. 



7. Captain Snow — in 1879 I think it was — found seals on Mooshir 

 Eocks. I and all the other hunters had been there the year before and 

 other years, but never saw seals. The whole fleet went there the next 

 year, but in the meantime the Japs had got those islands from the Eus- 

 sians and had landed men on every one that seals had ever been 



89 heard of on, and we got none. I went later in the season to Eob- 

 ben Eeef in the " Adele;" there were eleven schooners there, and 

 altogether we got 3,800 seals; we killed them all, or drove them away. 



8. It is a very simple matter to make a raid if it is gone about prop- 

 erly. All you have to do is to go quietly to the seals and drive a few of 



