74 THE ASIATIC FUK-SEAL ISLANDS. 



In 1870, however, tlie seals did not fare so well. In that year at least two 

 schooners raided the island. Oapt. D. Webster, of Pribilof Island fame, arrived 

 there iu the ha,vk Ma una Loa, with the schooner John Bright as a tender, and the 

 number of skins taken on Robben Island was about 15,000.' He told me that he took 

 everything he could lay his hands on, females and young, and that only 600 pups were 

 left. The skins were salted. 



The island was "practically cleaned out" again, so that when the representatives 

 of tlie lessees of the Russian Seal Islands arrived on Tiuleui in 1871 "there were 

 not over 2,000 seals to be found on the entire island." Oapt. G. Niebaum, a member 

 of the firm, landed there in August, and seeing the depleted state of the rookery 

 ordered that no killing should take place there that year, nor, in fact, until "such 

 time as seemed prudent to resume, so as to give the rookeries opportunity to recuper- 

 ate, leaving strict orders to the guard ship to protect them against molestation."^ 

 The result of this wise order was that in 1873, not more than two years after, the 

 rookeries Lad so far recovered that sealing could be commenced again on a small 

 scale, and about 2,700 seals were taken that year by the company, "knowing that the 

 killing of the useless male seals would accelerate the increase of the herd. From this 

 time forward the herd showed a steady and healthy growth,"^ and would probably 

 have continued so had it not been for the unparalleled boldness of the seal pirates. 

 They fitted out in Japan and sailed under various flags, British, G-erman, Dutch, 

 United States, etc., and from about 1879 paid special attention to searching for 

 hitherto unknown seal rookeries on the Kuril Islands and elsewhere in the Okhotsk 

 Sea, as well as raiding those already well known. Robben Island, being conveniently 

 located, poorly protected by a single schooner and a few Aleuts, and absolutely 

 unprotected later in the season, after the company had finished the legitimate catch, 

 was particularly exposed to the ravages of these marauders. The total number of 

 seals indiscriminately slaughtered by them on that lonely rock will never be known, 

 nor, probably, the names of all the vessels that took part. The following few 

 particulars, however, will give a good idea of the slaughter and the methods. 



In 1878, according to a memorandum kindly furnished me by Capt. H. J. Snow, 

 of Yokohama, the schooner Sarah Louise took 780 skins on Eobben Island. In_1879 the 

 Matinee is said to have taken 640 seals there, and the Mary G, Bohm 450; together, 

 1,090. It is probably to the raids of this year that W. F. Upson refers (Fur Seal 

 Arb., VIII, p. 724) when he states that he "was on the first schooner that raided 

 Robben Island, the Matinee, fitted out by H. Liebes, T. P. H. Whitelaw, and Isaac 

 Leonard," of San Francisco. 



1 Webster, according to the British Bering Sea Commission, put the number of skins he assisted 

 in taking at 15.000, but they add that "Kluge's estimate of the number taken was 10,000." When 

 reading this report on Bering Island in 1895, Mr. Kluge stated to me that he understood Webster's 

 catch iu 1870 to have been about 20,000, and that he did not "estimate" 10,000, as alleged by the. 

 commissioners, he not haviug been there at the time. (Rep. Brit. Bering Sea Comm., p. 89.) Mr. 

 C. H. Townsend informs me that Webster gave him the following account: "Between May 8 and 

 August 20 he killed 14,600. Half of the entire catch were females, although no females were killed 

 until after the pups were all born, or about the middle of July. The youngest pups, left motherless, 

 all died, the older ones being still alive when he left." Mr. Williams, the owner of the vessels, told 

 me that, according to his recollection, the total catch of the two vessels was about 15,000. 



'Niebaum, Fur Seal Arb., ili, p. 203. 



