INVESTIGATION" OP THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OE ALASKA. 551 



Mr. Clark. If Mr. Elliott denies his statement 



The Chairman (interposing). About a subject that really has no 

 material bearing, in my judgment, on what we are discussing 



Mr. Clark. It is put in here twice as an indisputable fact and it is 

 the most vital fact of this book if it were true. The whole fur-seal 

 difficulty at the present time turns on that. If the Russians killed 

 only males, then you have a right to stop land killing and to say that 

 land killing had something to do with the present sta'te of our herd. 

 If the Russians killed females, then the crisis through which the herd 

 passed in 1835 was due to killing of females, just as the crisis through 

 which the herd has passed in 1911 has been due to killing of the 

 females by pelagic sealers on the high seas. 



The Chairman. Is not the proposition that you are discussing now 

 practically what you said in paragraph 2, page 866, Appendix A of 

 your report ? 



Mr. Clark. I do not see any similarity between the statements. 



Mr. Elliott. It is the same killing he described. 



Mr. McGuntE. Mr. Chairman, this is developing the same point 

 and the most material point of Mr. Elliott's statements. It is not only 

 •material to have him develop further this point or to give us all there 

 *s with reference to Mr. Elliott's contradictions as he sees them, but it 

 s material, and very material, because it involves the question which 

 we argued in the House at such great length, of the effect of pelagic 

 sealing, and the further this point is developed the more light it throws 

 not only upon Mr. Elliott's contradictory statements but upon the 

 question of the killing of females through pelagic sealing at sea. I 

 suggest that we be permitted to proceed with this. 



The Chairman. I wish to say that I have seen about enough incon- 

 sistencies on the part of these scientists, who constantly dispute one 

 another, and it is enough to make a man's headache. The only rea- 

 son I suggest this is that we would like to get a limit in the discussion. 



Mr. McGuire. This is one of the most material points that has 

 been up. 



The Chairman. I suppose, as the old saying is, that we will get 

 along quicker by going ahead. 



Mr. McGutre. We are trying to get at the facts of what the Rus- 

 sians did which have a bearing not only on Mr. Elliott's statements, 

 but also on the question of pelagic sealing, which we argued in the 

 House and which was discussed at some length by members of 

 Congress who claimed that pelagic sealing was not responsible for the 

 diminution of the herd. This is important information. We never 

 have had any more important information than this one point. 



The Chairman. We might as well go ahead with it, but I really do 

 not see the materiality of it. 



Mr. Clark. Mr. Elliott, in his monograph did not completely 

 translate Veniaminof's article. Prof. Raphael Zon has made a com- 

 plete translation. At page six of Zon's manuscript, which is page 

 353 of the ZapisM article, occurs this statement; Veniaminof is 

 defining the classes of seals: 



Under the name of Kotiki, or gray pups, are classed the 4-months-old males and 

 females which were born in the spring, and which form the largest and almost the 

 entire quantity of seal used in the trade. 



That is a positive statement by Veniaminof that the Russians 

 killed the pups chiefly, and killed them, males and females. 



