672 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



iaminov, who has no official connection with this question, and 

 who never made a report to the Russian American Co., that I have 

 ever been able to find, or even hear of. 



Those are the only Russian authorities, official and unofficial, 

 which either Dr. Jordan or I have considered and quoted; indeed 

 they are the only ones that can be found which are worthy of any 

 credit as authors of record in the premises. 



Yahnovsky's record is of peculiar authority and beyond any sensi- 

 ble dispute. He was sent to the seal islands of Alaska direct from 

 St. Petersburg in 1818 by the board of directors of the Russian Amer- 

 can Co. as their confidential agent, to find out the precise cause of 

 steady annual diminution of catches of sealskins taken on the 

 Prililof Islands. He did so; his report was sent back to the board 

 from Sitka Februar} T 25, 1820, and its clear summary as officially 

 made by the board and embodied in letter "No. 6" of the American 

 case before the Paris tribunal, tells us authoritatively what was the 

 sole cause of that ruin of the seal herd wrought by the Russians 

 between 1804-1834, and when no such industry as pelagic sealing 

 existed, or had even been hinted at. 



On February 23, 1914, Mr. Clark read to the committee, from a 

 volume of the appendix to case of United States Fur Seal Arbitra- 

 tion, "letter Xo. 6, page 58, March 15, 1821," the translation thereon 

 of the Russian record of Yahnovskv's report upon the conduct of the 

 killing of fur seals by the Russian American Co.'s agents on the Pribi- 

 lof Islands (St. Paul and St. George), during the season of 1810. 



Mr. Clark then swore that this was the copy of the translation 

 used by the Governmenl of the CJnited States when it prosecuted its 

 case against Great Britian at Paris, before the Bering Sea tribunal 

 (April-August, 1893). 



Mr. (lark made this statement with the volume in his hands and 

 as printed in September, 1892, from which he read that translation 

 of copy of letter No. 6, in re report of Yalmovsky, either knowing 

 or not knowing that the Government of the CJnited States had offi- 

 cially withdrawn this identical copy which he had read from the case, 

 on November 19, L892, because it was a "false translation," and 

 that our Government had substituted for it a "revised translation," 

 on November 19, 1892, which appears in Volume VIII. Appendix 

 I— II, Fur Seal Arbitration, page 323, and the citation order of its 

 withdrawal, and substitution of this "revised translation" aforesaid, 

 is made in Volume VII, countercaseof the United States, pages 13, 14, 

 152, 153, and on page 305, of said Volume VIII, and immediately 

 preceding said copy of the "revised translation." 



Mr. Waikixs. Did Mr. Clark have any reasonable opportunity 

 of knowing that that had been repudiated by the Government? 



Mr. Elliott. I am coming right to that and will show you that he 

 had. I will resume my statement right there. 



This publication of that spurious and repudiated translation of 

 letter "No. 6" aforesaid, is made on page 323, in a deadly parallel 

 column with the correct or "revised translation" of letter No. 6. 

 When Mr. Clark read to this committee the rejected and denounced 

 copy as the one which had been actually used by the United States 

 Government, and shut his eyes at the same moment to the proof 

 published as stated above (on the same page) that it was a "false 

 translation," and a- such had been repudiated November 10, 1802, 



