56 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA, 



never leave the spot upon which they are dropped more than a few feet in any direc- 

 tion until the rutting season ends; then they are allowed, with their mothers, by the 

 old bulls to scatter over all the ground they want to. At this date the compact system 

 of organization and massing on the breeding grounds is solidly maintained by the bulls; 

 it is not relaxed in the least until on and after July 20." [Transcript from the author's 

 field notes of 1874. Nah Speelkie, St. Paul Island, July 12.] 



Now, with this life study before him, proportioned to the exact attitudes, sizes, and 

 disposition of a harem of fur seals, what does Jordan say? Hear him: "It is true that 

 Mr. Elliott justifies in part his small unit of space by certain references to the coming 

 and going of the animals. He asserts that after the pups are born the 'individual cows 

 are' not on their allotted space one-fourth of the time, and that the females 'almost 

 double their number on the rookery ground without expanding its original limits.' 

 But Mr. Elliott failed to grasp what this really meant. He sees in it only justification 

 for the unit of space, which he has assigned to the individual animals. It should have 

 called his attention to the fact that the breeding seals which he saw before him, and 

 which he was attempting to enumerate, were but a part and not the whole of the 

 rookery population." 



It seems utterly incredible that any man with the least regard for the express 

 command of written directions like those which I have published, as above quoted, 

 could make such a ridiculous and senseless reduction of them. Dr. Jordan has, 

 however, done so, and here we have the evidence of his weakness in cold type. 



In closing I can fitly say that the shame and ruin which overtook our cause of the 

 fur seals at Paris in 1893 was no sin of mine, and the continuance of that shame and 

 mummery of shallow experts on the rookeries in the Treasury and in the State De- 

 partment up to the close of Jordan's work in 1898 was also against my protest. Now 

 that the curtain has rung down on this last seal commission farce of our Government, 

 with its harlequin show of branding baby fur seals on the islands, "perfect agreement " 

 with England, and searching the seal sacks of our returning women from Canada and 

 Europe in New York, all to the utter indifference of the pelagic sealer, whom the 

 business was to hurt, it is to be hoped that a further confession of this impotence of 

 our people to meet the Canadians in open argument for some method of saving our 

 fur-seal herd from indecent and cruel slaughter may be avoided. 



The responsibility for the ruin of the Pribilof herds primarily belongs to Benjamin 

 Harrison, James G. Blaine, and the two Fosters — "ex-Gov." Charles and the "Hon." 

 John W. We had an admirable case and abundant information at our command, but 

 the two Fosters (par nobile fratrum!) ignored it, and put the whole question into the 

 hands of vaporing lawyers and ridiculous experts. They gave us the absurd Paris 

 "regulations" in 1893. 



The steady continuation of this scandalous order on the seal islands since has been 

 made by the indifference of Grover Cleveland and the wretched egotism of Richard 

 Olney (had Gresham lived the tables would have been turned), ably supplemented 

 by the present administration. 



The whole business since 1890 has been a scandal in our departments and an im- 

 position upon the taxpayers of the United States. 



Henry W. Elliott. 



Lakewood, Ohio, September 20, 1899. 



Mr. Elliott. It was this publication, as above, which opened the eyes of Secretary 

 John Hay and caused him to agree with my proposal made to him April 2, 1900, per 

 Hon. Theodore E. Burton (my Representative), and which led to my engagement 

 with him of April 30-May 3, 1900, by which the act of April 8, 1904, was secured by 

 my initiation, and by which authority he reopened this fur-seal case with Great 

 Britain April 16, 1904, with me as his adviser and expert in the premises. 



In hearing No. 14, pages 1000-1001, July 30, 1912, House Com- 

 mittee on Expenditures in the Department of Commerce and Labor, 

 appears the following relation with regard to the census of 1872-1874 : 



Mr. Elliott. During the hearing of the Senate Committee on Territories on "Gen- 

 eral conditions in Alaska," February 23, 1912, I was called upon by the chairman, 

 Senator William Alden Smith, to inform the committee how I made my enumeration, 

 of the fur-seal herd in 1872-1874, and the followin? statement and inquiries were made 

 to wit (pp. 17, 18, 19): 



"Senator Hitchcock. Are they unable to count the seals there? 



"Mr. Wilson 1 . I could not really answer that question. 



"Senator Chamberlain. I do not see how they could count them. 



"Mr. Wilson. It is a difficult matter to count "them on the rookeries. 



