II . FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 



• It is further shown by the testimony before the committee that on 

 their return to the islands, after their temporary absence during the 

 winter, these animals generally select the locations on the rookeries 

 which they had formerly occupied. It appears, too, that all the Alaskan 

 fur seals are born on these islands 5 that they are distinct animals, and 

 have none of the characteristics of fish, and will drown in the water 

 until they are taught to swim by their elders. 



In former years fur seals were found in great numbers on various isl- 

 ands of the South Pacific Ocean ; but after a comparatively short 

 period of indiscriminate slaughter the rookeries were deserted, the ani- 

 mals having been killed or driven from their haunts; so that now the 

 only existing rookeries are those in Alaska, another in the Russian part 

 of Bering Sea, and a third on Lobos Island, at the mouth of the river 

 Plate in South America. 



All these rookeries are under the protection of their several Goyern- 

 ments. 



The best estimate as to the number of these animals on the Alaska 

 rookeries places it at about four millions ; but a marked diminution of 

 the number is noticed within the last two or three years, which is attrib- 

 uted by the testimony to the fact that unauthorized persons during the 

 summers of 1886, 1887, and 1888 had fitted out expeditions and cruised 

 in Alaskan waters, and by the use of fire arms destroyed hundreds of 

 thousands of these animals, without regard to age or sex. 



The law prohibits the killing of fur seals in the Territory of Alaska 

 or the waters thereof, except by the lessee of the seal islanls, and the 

 lessee is permitted to kill during the mouths of June, July, September, 

 and October only; and is forbidden to kill any seal less than one year 

 old, or any female seal, " or to kill such seals at any time by the use of 

 fire-arms, or by other means tending to drive the seals away from those 

 islands." (Rev. Stat., sec. 1960.) 



Governor Simpson, of the Hudson Bay Company, in his " Overland 

 Journey Round the World," 1841-'42, p. 130, says : 



Some twenty or thirty years ago there was a most wasteful destructioa of the seal, 

 when young and ohl, male and female, were indiscriminately knocked in the head. 

 This imprudence, as any one might have expected, proved detrimental in two ways. 

 The race was- almost extirpated ; and the market was glutted to such a degree, at 

 the rate for some time of 200,000 skins a year, that the prices did not even pay the ex- 

 penses of carriage. The Russians, however, have now adopted nearly the same plan 

 which the Hudson Bay Company pursues in recruiting any of its exhausted districts, 

 killing only a limited number of such males as have attained their full growth, apian 

 peculiarly applicable to the fur seal, inasmuch as its habits render a system of hus- 

 banding the stock as easy and certain as that of destroying it. 



In the year 1800 the rookeries of the Georgian Islands produced 

 112,000 fur seals. From 1806 to 1823, says the Encyclopaedia Britanica, 

 "The Georgian Islands produced 1,200,000 seals, and the island of Des- 

 olation has been equally productive." Over 1,000,000 were taken from 

 the island of Masaiuera and shippe<l to China in 1798-'99. (Fanniug's 

 " Vovages to the South Sea," ]). 299.'> 



In 1820 and 1821 over 300,000 fur seals were taken at the South Shet- 

 land Islands, and Captain Weddell states that at the end of Uie second 

 year the species had there become almost exterminated. In addition to 

 the number killed for their furs, he estimates that " not less than 

 100,000 newly born young died in consequence of the destruction of their 

 mothers." (See Elliott's Rep., 1884, p. 118.) 



In 1830 the supply of fur seals in the South Seas had so greatly de- 

 creased that the vessels engaged in this enterprise " generally made los- 



