474 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
Q. They had shot 300 rounds of ammunition?—A. Yes, Sir. Another entry I saw 
was: ‘Seven seals shot from the deck, but only secured one.” All lost but one. 
Another entry: ‘‘It is very discouraging to issue a large quantity of ammunition to 
your boats, and have so few seals returned.” An entry was made in another place, 
where he gave it as his opinion that he did not secure one seal-skin ont of every fifty 
seals wounded and killed. 
Q. Have you seen seal-skins upon the island that had been shot?—A. Very often. 
We gather handfuls of shot every season. 
Q. Does that injure the market value of the skins?—A. Undoubtedly. Any hole 
is an injury to the skin. 
Extract from Mr. 'Tingle’s Report to the Treasury Department: 
I am now convinced from what I gather, in questioning the men belonging to cap- 
tured schooners and from reading the logs of the vessels, that not more than one seal 
in ten killed and mortally wounded is landed on the boats and skinned; thus you 
will see the wanton destruction of seal life without any benefit whatever. I think 
30,000 skins taken this year by the marauders is a low estimate on this basis; 300,000 
fur-seals were killed to secure that number, or three times as many as the Alaska 
Commercial Company are allowed by law to kill. Youcan readily see that this great 
slaughter of seals will in a few years make it impossible for 100,000 skins to be taken 
on the islands by the lessees. I earnestly hope more vigorous measures will be 
adopted by the Government in dealing with these destructive law-breakers. 
William Gavitt, an Agent of the United States Treasury, gave this testimony: 
Q. I understand you to say—for instance, taking 1887 or 1888—that the 100,000 
seals taken upon the islands and the 40,000 taken and killed in the water, if no 
ereater amount was taken, that there would be no perceptible diminution’in the 
number of seal; that by the natural increase the Company might take 40,000 more 
than now if it were not for the depredations?—A. I had in mind an average between 
25,000 killed in 1888 and about 40,000 in 1887. 
Q. What I want to know is this: Is it yeur opinion that the number taken in the 
sea, when they are on the way from the islands to the feeding-grounds, have a tend- 
eney to demoralize the seal and to break up their habits, their confidence, &c.?—A. 
It would be likely to doit. They are very easily frightened, and the discharge of 
fire-arms has a tendency to frighten them away. 
By Mr. MacDonald: 
Q. No seals are killed by the Company in this way?—A. No, Sir; they are all 
killed on the islands with clubs. 
Jacob H. Moulton, an Agent of the Government, testified: 
Q. Do you think it essential to the preservation of seal life to protect the seal in 
the waters of Alaska and the Pacific?—A. There is no doubt about it. 
Q. The herd could be exterminated without taking them upon the islands?—A. 
They could be exterminated by a system of maranding in the Behring’s Sea, but I 
think the number killed along the british Columbia coast did not affect the number 
we were killing on the islands at that time, because there was apparently an increase 
during these years. There had been for five or six years up to that time. Since that 
time in Behring’s Sea the seal have been gradually decreasing. 
Q. You think their decrease is attributable to unlawful hunting in Behring’s 
Sea?—A. There is no doubt of that. 
Q. As a result of your observation there, could you suggest any better method of 
preserving seal life in Behring’s Sea than that now adopted?—A. Not unless they 
furnished more revenue-vessels and men-of-war. 
Q. So as to patrol the sea closely?—A. I think so. I donot think the seals scatter 
much through any great distance during the summer season, although very late in 
the summer the smaller seals arrive. The females, after giving birth to their young, 
scatter out in Behring’s Sea for food. We know they leave the islands to go into the 
water, because they are coming and going. They suckle their young the same as’ 
most animals. 
Q. Lawless hunters killeverything they find, I believe, females or not?—A. Yes, Sir. 
Q. When a female is nursing her young and goes out for food and is killed or 
wounded, that results also in the death of her young?—A. Yes, Sir. As her young 
does not go into the water, it does not do anything for some time, and cannot swim 
and has to be taught. 
Q. The seals are born upon those islands?—A. Yes, Sir; they come there for that 
purpose. They come there expressly to breed, because if they dropped their young 
in the water the pup would drown. 
Q. Do you think the value of the seals justifies the policy that the Government 
pursues for their preservation and protection?—A. Yes, Sir; I do. 
Q. And under a rigidly enforced system protecting seal life in the waters of 
433 these seas do you think the herd could be materially increased?—-A. I think it 
would. I think there is no doubt but what it would, 
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