APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. ry | 
It is thus seen that a private monopoly was conceded on the islands 
frequented by the fur-seals hardly three years after the expiration of 
that of the Russo-American Company. 
This monopoly was recognized to be necessary by the two Govern- 
ments in consequence of the conclusions of the Russian and American 
Commissions which were appointed for the purpose of examining the 
question of fur-seal hunting and the means of preserving these animals 
from complete destruction. 
According to the terms of the Russian Contract, the number of seals 
which the Company has the right of killing is regulated every year by 
the local Russian authorities. Hunting can only be carried on by the 
inhabitants, except on Seal Island, where the Company can employ its 
own huniers, the island being uninhabited. 
In exchange for each skin the Company must pay the natives a cer- 
tain price as provided for in the Contract. The season of hunting is 
strictly limited. 
What most hinders the increase of the fur-seals is the illicit hunting 
which takes place in the open sea, as well as on the Japanese Islands 
and sometimes on Seal Island after the departure of the Company’s 
ship, which takes place generally about the middle of October. Accord- 
ing to the Japanese Customs Reports, 3,400 fur-seal skins, which rep- 
resent the produce of this kind of poaching, were imported into Japan 
in 1884, which amounts to 50 per cent. of all the seal-furs exported from 
- Japan. 
Till 1862 there was no law in this country prohibiting fur-seal hunt- 
ing. In 1862 a Law was passed forbidding it, but without effect, as the 
islands were not sufficiently defended against the inroads of poachers. 
In the autumn the fur-seals leave the land and make for the south of 
the Aleutian Islands, where they stay for the rest of the year in the 
open sea. It is then that they are exposed to the attacks of ships 
equipped for the hunt which destroy them by every means, fire-arms, 
nets, harpoons, &c., without distinguishing males from females with 
young. Only a third of the animals killed in this way are utilized; the 
rest are lost without any profit. It is to these proceedings that the 
almost complete disappearance of fur-seals from the coasts of Chile and 
South Africa, as well as from the Falkland Islands, is to be attributed. 
It is to be feared that the same fate is reserved for the islands of the 
Behring’s Sea unless efficacious measures are ehoculy aclopted to pro- 
tect the fur-seals. 
208 No. 138. 
Colonial Office to Foreign Office.—(Received July 26.) 
DOWNING STREET, July 25, 1888. 
_ Sir: With reference to previous correspondence respecting the seiz- 
ure of British sealing-vessels in the Behring’s Sea, I am directed by 
Lord Knutsford to transmit to you, to be laid before the Marquis of 
Salisbury, a copy of a despatch from the Governor-General of Canada, 
with its inclosures, relating to the circumstances in which the schooner 
‘“W. P. Sayward” was released under bond at Sitka. 
lam, We. 
(Signed) JOHN BRAMSTON. 
