Depletion of the Fur-Seal in the Southern Seas. 455 
yielded large quantities of seals. Numerous vessels visited 
it soon after its discovery, and shore parties lived there for 
considerable periods. Portions of wrecks and graves of 
sailors attest these facts. An American poaching vessel 
which came out to visit it during the close season, ten 
years ago, met with disappointing results and lost a boat’s 
crew there. Recent cruises have yielded a few seals in 
this field. 
Macquarrie Island, which lies outside the jurisdiction of 
New Zealand, in lat. 55°, is now the home of countless great 
king penguins and of numerous sea-elephants. This was 
the most remarkable sealing ground in this part of the 
world. It is 650 miles from the Bluff Harbour and 800 
from Tasmania, to which it is politically attached and the 
Government of which now prohibits the destruction of its 
native animals and birds. It is not known who discovered 
it, as the discovery by some Sydney sealing vessel, which 
occurred about 1811, was evidently kept a secret at first. I 
suspect that the entry of sealskins from Figi already men- 
tioned was part of the process of keeping the secret. It is 
said that this small island, not more than twenty-five miles 
long and less than half that width, yielded to the discoverers 
no less than 80,000 seals. There is evidence that the pur- 
suit was continued in later years, until dogs brought there 
by shore parties, destroyed the young seals and extermin- 
ated the race. This was facilitated by the fact that there 
are no considerable cliffs, the herbage everywhere dipping 
nearly to the sea. JI may mention that Professor Scott 
of the Otago University, who visited the island in 1880, 
found that the furseal was then absolutely unknown 
there; and though shore parties have worked there pretty 
nearly ever since boiling down sea-elephants, and several 
kinds of seals are seen, the fur-seal has never reappeared. 
This appears to support the statement made to me by Cap- 
tain Fairchild that the fur-seal of these seas returns to 
breed at its own station and that it is useless’ to try and 
shift it to another. 
