214 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



These "Hitchcock rules" prohibit the taking of "any seals under 

 2 years of age, and having skins weighing less than 5h pounds. ' 

 (Hearing No. 10, pp. 482, 483.) 



March 9, 1906. The "Metcalf rules,'' ordered to-day, change the 

 5J-pound minimum weight of the Hitchcock rules to 5 pounds; 

 otherwise no change is made in the order of the same. (See Hearing 

 No. 10, p. 483.) 



April 21, 1910. Act repeals leasing section of act of 1870; other- 

 wise does not change the full control hitherto given the Secretary of 

 Commerce and Labor to govern by regulations the seal killing on the 

 islands, etc. (See Hearing No. 10, pp. 480-481.) 



February 29, 1912. Chief Special Agent Lembkey, in charge of the 

 seal islands, swears that the regulations of the department bind him 

 not to kill seals "under 2 years of age" and that they are in effect, 

 to wit: 



Mr. .Madden. If they were killed it would be a violation of law. 



Mr. Lembkey. It would; if the regulations permitted it, however, it would be in 

 accordance with existing law. 



It should be remembered also that the law does not prohibit the killing of any male 

 seal over 1 year or 12 months of age, although regulations of the department do prohibit 

 the killing of anything less than 2 years old, or those seals which have returned to the 

 islands from their second migration. 



Mr. Towxsexd. That is a regulation of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor? 



Mr. Lembkey. Of Commerce and Labor; yes, sir. (Hearing Xo. 9, p. 373.) 



A list of 128,000 yearling sealskins taken on the seal islands of Alaska 

 by tiie lessees thereof during the term of their lease from May 1, 1890, to 

 May 1, 1910. 



One hundred and twenty thousand of these one hundred and 

 twenty-eight thousand yearling seals have been taken in open, 

 flagrant violation of the Carlisle rules of May 14, 1896, and the 

 Hitchcock rules of May 1, 1904, which rules of the Treasury and 

 Commerce and Labor Departments have the force of law. 



These. 120,000 sealskins, itemized in Elliott's list, are the skins of 

 "small pups" and "extra small pups," as listed in the sales at Lon- 

 don, each and every one of which has been measured there and 

 certified to the trade there as being less than 34 inches long, and, so 

 certified, sold upon that certification as to its size and class as a 

 "small pup" or "extra small pup." 



These measurements of the London sales classification are ad- 

 mitted by the Bureau of Fisheries as being absolutely accurate. 



Under oath, the Bureau of Fisheries agent and man who has taken 

 all the skins with the cooperation of the lessees on the Pribilof 

 Islands since 1899 up to 1910 — this agent admitted that a yearling 

 sealskin of his own identification and measurement as such was 36^ 

 inches long. (See Hearing No. 9, pp. 442, 443. Apr. 13, 1912. 



• Com. Exp. Dept. of Com. and Labor.) 



