INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 653 



these weights in order to determine whether or not the addition of 

 salt added to the weight of the sealskin, and I had nothing in regard 

 to the blubbering of the skins in mind at the time, but as we went 

 along I made a mental note of the fact that there were discrepancies; 

 that is, because a skin was of a larger length did not seem to indicate 

 that it would weigh more than a skin of shorter length. My atten- 

 tion was not called to this condition, but I could not help noticing 

 that some of the skins were thicker in blubber than others, and to 

 me it seemed that that was the cause of the difference. 



The Chairman. Which skins were thicker in blubber, the short 

 ones or the'long ones ? 



Mr. Gallagher. The short ones. 



The Chairman. Did you notice that ? 



Mr. Gallagher. Yes, sir; I noticed that. 



The Chairman. How was your attention attracted to this? Did 

 Mr. Elliott call your attention to it or anybody else ? 



Mr. Gallagher. No, sir; he did not call my attention to it, nor did 

 anyone else call my attention to it. As I say, I noticed, as we went 

 along, that the fact that a skin was longer was no assurance that it 

 was goin^ to weigh more than a shorter skin. Then I began to notice 

 the fact that some of the skins were cleaner than others. 



Mr. Stephens. Which were the cleaner ones — the larger ones or 

 the smaller ones? 



Mr. Gallagher. The larger ones were cleaned off pretty well. 



Mr. Bruckner. How thick was the blubber on some of them ? 



Mr. Gallagher. I would not like to put it in dimensions. 



Mr. Bruckner. But there was 



Mr. Gallagher (interposing). There was blubber as thick as my 

 finger on some of them. 



The Chairman. There was something said before the committee 

 about Mr. Clark insisting on measuring the girth — is that correct or 

 not? 



Mr. Gallagher. I never heard Mr. Clark mention the girth meas- 

 urement, and I am particularly positive of that, because when I had 

 an opportunity to read Mr. Clark's report on this season's work on 

 the islands, I saw that he made reference to the fact that we did not 

 take the girth measurement, and that seemed to me to be a pretty 

 good point on the surface, so I mentioned that fact to both the 

 Chairman and Mr. Elliott. But that was called to my mind for the 

 first time on reading his report. That was the first time I had ever 

 heard of it. 



Mr. Bruckner. You are positive of that ? 



Mr. Gallagher. Yes, sir. 



The Chairman. One more question about this matter of weights. 

 Did you notice the difference, so far as percentage is concerned, in 

 some of the sizes of the skins that were taken and noted in your 

 report ? 



Mr. Gallagher. Yes, sir. I was looking over this report last 

 night, and I noted two in particular. Skin No. 4275, which is 32 

 inches long, weighed 8 pounds 1\ ounces, and skin No. 4225, which 

 is also 32 inches long, weighed 4 pounds \\ ounces. There are two 

 skins of the same length, and there is a difference of slightly over 

 100 per cent in the weights. Now it seems to me that even if there 

 was a difference in the girth measurements no such possible difference 



