740 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
Government in seeking to prevent the killing of seal in the open waters of Beh- 
ring’s Sea. The information referred to shows a good deal more than that. It 
shows, what was perhaps unexpected, that the threatened extermination of the 
seal is due in large part to the legalized driving and killing on land by the lessees 
of the sealing grounds, which must also be suspended if seal life is to be preserved. 
With these facts established by evidence that no one can dispute, there ought to be 
no great difficulty in effecting an agreement between the United States and Great 
Britain for the immediate prohibition of any seal-killing by anybody the coming 
season, and a subsequent arrangement that will avoid any further conflict over this 
question. 
, When the “Sayward” case-was appealed to the United States Supreme Conrt, 
the negotiations were in what appeared to be a confused and unsatisfactory state. 
Sir Julian Pauncefote had embarrassed Mr. Blaine by quoting President Cleveland’s 
Special Agent at the sealing grounds, Mr. George R. Tingle, who affirmed before a 
Committee of Congress that the seal was increasing in number, and that the rook- 
eries were never in better condition; and Mr. Blaine was dilating at length upon 
the historical rights of the United States in Behring’s Sea. But he was quietly 
doing a good deal more than that. He was having the actual condition of affairs at 
the sealing grounds thoroughly investigated by Professor Henry W. Elliott, of the 
Smithsonian Institution, a Special Commissioner appointed in pursuance of the Act 
of Congress approved on the 5th April, 1890, who is the best living authority on seal 
life; so that he might be able to demonstrate the falsity, or gross inaccuracy, of 
Mr. Tingle’s testimony, which could not be refuted in any other way. 
Following is Professor Elliott’s Report, submitted to the late Secretary Windom, 
in November last, and which is now made public: 
CLEVELAND, OHI0, November 17, 1890. 
Hon. WILLIAM WINDoM, Secretary of the Treasury. 
Str: On the 7th April last I received from your hands my appointment as the 
Special Agent created in Act of Congress, approved the 5th April, 1890: this Act 
orders and provides for a thorough examination into the present status of the fur- 
seal industry of our Government as embodied on the seal islands of Alaska, so as to 
make known its relative condition now as compared with its prior form and well- 
being in 1872, and for other kindred lines of inquiry. 
I may as well frankly confess at the outset that I was wholly unaware of the 
extraordinary state of affairs which stared me in the face at the moment of my first 
landing, last May, on the seal islands of Alaska. I embarked upon this mission 
with only a faint apprehension of viewing anything more than a decided diminution 
of the Pribyloff rookeries, caused by pelagic sealing during the last five or six years. 
But from the moment of my landing at St. Paul’s Island on the 21st May last until 
the close of the breeding season those famous ‘‘rookeries” and “hauling grounds” 
of the fur-seal thereon, and of St. George’s Island, too, began to declare and have 
declared to my astonished senses the fact, that their utter ruin and extermination is 
only a question of a few short years from date unless prompt and thorough measures 
of relief and protection are at once ordered on sea and on land by the Treasury 
Department, and enforced by. it. 
Quickly realizing, after my arrival upon these islands, that a remarkable change 
for the worse had taken place since my finished work of 1874 was given to the public 
in that same year and the year also of my last survey of these rookeries, I 
54 took the field at once, carrying hourly and daily with me a series of note 
books opened under following heads: 
The ‘‘rookeries,” their area, position, and condition, in 1872, 1874-90. 
The “‘hauling grounds,” their appearance in 1872, 1874-90. 
The inethod of ‘‘driving” and taking fur-seals in 1872, 1874-90. 
The selection of skins, grade, and supply, in 1872, 1874-90. 
Character, condition, and number of natives in 1872, 1874-90. 
). Conduct of native labour and pay in 1872, 1874-90. 
To these heads I add the following sections in their order as mentioned, thus con- 
stituting the full body of my Report, which is preceded by this letter of transmissal: 
7. The protection and preservation of these fur-bearing interests of our Govern- 
ment on the Pribyloft Islands, the immediate action necessary, viewed in the fnll 
light of existing danger. 
8. Appendix, in which the author’s daily field notes appear, verbatim et literatim, 
in order of day and date. 
9. Revised general Maps of St. Paul and St. George, showing the area and position 
of the hauling grounds of the fur-seal thereon in 1872-74, and again in 1890. 
10. A series of special Maps showing the exact topography, area, and position of 
the breeding rookeries of St. Pau) and St. George Islands in 1872-74, and again in 
1890, together with an illustration of each rookery drawn from life by tbe author. 
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