RAIDS ON THE COMMANDER ISLANDS. 187 



steamer Alehsander II at G-linka, but was found to have " 4 to 5 fur seals only." On 

 the next day Mr. Grebnitski boarded the schooner Alexander, Captain Littlejohn. 

 The latter swore that he had shot the 63 seals found on board, denying that he had 

 been near a rookery, and was warned off. Captain Sandman, on August 12, confis- 

 cated 4 sea otters from the schooner Flying Mist, Captain Bradford, which was found 

 at anchor " around the Northwest Cape (Copper Island) close inshore about 8' SE, 

 from rocks," but with " apparently no seals," 



On September 1 the kossak and a watchman boarded the schooner Seventy Six, 

 Captain Potts, off the Southeast Cape, Copper Island, finding only one man on board, 

 the rest being on shore. The watchmen went after them, but the schooner's crew 

 made directly for the vessel as soon as they saw them coming and got away. "On 

 shore the watchman found about 40 seal carcasses which the schooner's people had 

 killed and skinned — all bulls." 



The raiders did not confine themselves to Copper Island by any means, for on 

 September 10 an unknown schooner visited the South Eookery on Bering Island, 

 killing about 25 seals, and two days later a schooner, possibly the same, was reported 

 "on the north side shooting seals at sea," but left on the approach of the steamer 

 Aleksander II. After the departure of the latter, the schooner came in again on 

 September 13, but the whaleboat which was sent ashore was driven away, by the 

 natives firing at the crew, before any seals were killed. 



Captain Littlejohn, in the schooner Alexander, evidently took no heed of the 

 warning given him, for, on October 16, he was on the Glinka rookeries and took " some 

 seals again," an exploit which he repeated on the moonlight night of the 18th, when 

 he secured "a number of seals (mostly cows) before morning." 



Although the record for 1881 is not quite so black, it is in some respects fully as 

 interesting. 



On Bering Island two schooners appeared at the North Eookery on October 8 

 and landed 6 whaleboats, killing many seals, mostly females and young ones. Mr. 

 Grebnitski himself went to the rookery, but the shooner had already left. Exactly a 

 week later two schooners again arrived off the north rookery, possibly the same, 

 landing 6 whaleboats early in the morning of October 16. This time, however, the 

 natives were prepared, and 40 of them, well armed with rifles, met the raiders. The 

 latter now opened negotiations, the captain offering a gold watch to the chief, money 

 to the men, and whisky to all for the privilege of taking 300 fur seals. The natives 

 refused, and the raiders, after having examined some of the Berdan breech-loading 

 rifles and having received an affirmative answer to their question whether the natives 

 would shoot if they should attempt to kill any seals, withdrew. " Seeing that they 

 could do nothing, they put to sea." 



It is probably to a raid in 1881 that Mr. S. L. Beckwith's testimony relates (Fur 

 Seal Arb. vm, p. 810), in which he states that as "a mate on the vessel Alexander, 

 belonging to Hermann Liebes, of which Captain Carlson was master," "in 1880, or 

 thereabouts," he " went ashore and raided Copper Island, and got about 100 seals, and 

 we would have got a great many more, for we had about 1,200 killed when we were 

 fired upon. A Japanese vessel was there the day before raiding, and several of the 

 raiders were shot." This last information seems to tally with the following record 

 from Bering Island: "October 11. A schooner has been at Staraya Gavan, Buried 

 oae Japanese," 



