470 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
ion and jurisdiction over Behring’s Sea and the waters of Alaska, would you think 
it would be a wise policy to adhere to and maintain that jurisdiction and dominion 
complete, or would it be wiser to declare it the high sea in the legal sense?—A. In 
the light of to-day I should say keep what you have got. 
Q. Hold it as a closed sea?—A. Fisheries within those limits are yet to be devel- 
oped, and it wovld seem to be very unwise to open up possible fishery contentions 
which are very likely to arise by such a course. 
Q. You think that would be, then, the wiser policy to maintain such jurisdiction 
and dominion as we have, and to concede to the vessels of other nations such rights 
as are not inconsistent with the interests which our nation has there and which need 
protection?’—A. Exactly that; the right of transit through the sea wherever they 
please, but positive protection to seal life. 
Q. You do not think it would be wise to grant anything else?—A. No, Sir; not 
at all. 
Q. And in no case to surrender the power of policing the sea?—A. No, Sir; under 
no circumstances. 
Q. Could that power and jurisdiction be surrendered and yet preserve this seal 
life on these rookeries and the value of our fisheries that may be developed there ?— 
A. Only with very great risk, because, if that right is surrendered, and thereby the 
right to police the sea, the depredations that are made upon the seal wherever they 
may be found, wherever men thought they could carry them out without being 
taken in the act, would be carried out. So it would be difficult in regard to the 
fisheries. Wherever they could kill these seals they certainly would be there, and 
it would be impossible to prevent them. 
429 In the statements and statistics relative to the fur-seal fisheries submitted 
by C. A. Williams in 1888 to the Committee of Congress on Merchant Marine 
and Fisheries, appears the following: 
Examination of the earliest records of the fur-seal fishery shows that from the 
date of man’s recognition of the value of the fur the pursuit of the animal bearing 
it has been unceasing and relentless. Save in the few instances to be noted here- 
after, where Governments have interposed for the purpose of protecting seal life, 
having in view benefits to accrue in the future, the animal has been wantonly 
slaughtered, with no regard forage, sex, or condition. The mature male, the female 
heavy with young, the pup, dependent for life on the mother, each and all have 
been indiscriminately killed or left to die of want. ‘This cruel and useless butchery 
has resulted in complete extermination of the fur-seal from localities which were 
once frequented by millions of the species; and, so far as these localities are con- 
cerned, has obliterated an industry which a little more enlightened selfishness 
might have preserved in perpetuity to the great benefit of all ranks of civilized 
society. Nothing less than stringent laws, with will power to enforce them against 
all violators, can preserve for man’s benefit the remnant of a race of animals so 
interesting and so useful. 
The most valuable “rookery,” or breeding-place, of these animals ever known to 
man is now in the possession of the United States. How it has been cared for in 
former years and brought to its present state of value and usefulness will be shown 
later on. But the matter of its preservation and perpetuation intact is the impor- 
tant question of the moment, and that this question may be considered intelligently 
the evidence is here presented of the wanton destruction that has befallen these 
animals when left unprotected by the law to man’s greed and selfishness, which, it 
is fair to say, is all that could be expected from the unlicensed hunter, whose nature 
seeks individual and immediate gain, with no regard for a future in which he has 
no assurance of personal advantage. 
The following statistics are gathered from the journals of early navigators, and 
such commercial records as are now ayailable are submitted. 
Kerguelen Land.—An island in Southern Indian Ocean, discovered about 1772. 
The sbores of this island were teeming with fur-seal when it first became known. 
Between the date of its discovery and the year 1800 over 1,200,000 seal-skins were 
taken by the British vessels from the island, and seal life thereon was exterminated. 
Crozetts.—TVhe Crozett Islands, in same ocean and not far distant, were also visited 
and hunted over and the seal life there totally exhausted. 
Mas-d-Fuera.—An island in Southern Pacific Ocean, latitude 38° 48’ south, longi- 
tude 80° 34’ west, came next in order of discovery, and from its shores in a few years 
were gathered and shipped 1,200,000 fur-seal skins. 
Delano, chapter 17, p. 306, says of Mas-a-Fuera: 
““When the Americans came to this place in 1797 and began to make a business of 
killing seals, there is no doubt but there were 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 of them on the 
island. I have made an estimate of more than 3,000,000 that have been carried to 
tanton from thence in the space of seven years. I have carried more than 100,000 
myself, and have been at the place when there were the people of fourteen ships or 
vessels on the island at one time killing seals.” 
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