INVESTIGATION OF THE EUB-SEAL INDUSTEY OE ALASKA. 823 



skins found on board, these sealing schooners are then ordered to proceed direct to 

 Sitka and report for trial there. The vessels, however, all disobey this order and sail, 

 instead, for their home port, Victoria, as soon as they leave Bering Sea. Their return 

 and story raises an immense uproar throughout all Canada. 



1S90: The printed protest of Lord Salisbury and the threat on his part to have a 

 British gunboat convoy the British sealing fleet this year if Mr. Blaine persisted in 

 his policy of seizure on the high seas caused Mr. Blaine to secretly countermand the 

 seizure orders in so far as giving notice to our people went; the Victoria sealers were, 

 however, duly advised of this action by their agents in London. Mr. Blaine then pro- 

 ceeded to justify his action in a contra bonos mores letter to Salisbury; but unfortu- 

 nately for Blaine, through his ignorance he quoted certain worthless figures and 

 reports of an incompetent and unworthy United States Treasury agent, who had denied 

 these same figures and facts in another official report. In the meantime, the Secretary 

 of the Treasurv, William Windom, in cooperation with Congress, sends Henry W. 

 Elliott up to the Pribilof Islands to review and report to him upon the condition of 

 affairs thereon [act approved Apr- 5, 1890]. Mr. Elliott submits his report November 

 19, 1890; he declares the herd reduced from 4,500,000 seals in 1874 to a scant million 

 in 1890; he urges a modus vivendi whereby for seven years a complete suspension 

 of all seal killing on the islands and in the sea shall be agreed to by Great Britain and 

 the United States; in the meantime, a joint commission of British and American ex- 

 perts shall visit the islands, and after full investigation thereon to agree upon a proper 

 method of joint control of the killing of seals when that work might be resumed after 

 the herd was restored to its normal form and number. During this interval of Mr. 

 Elliott's work Mr. Blaine did nothing; but finally, ignoring Mr. Elliott's recommenda- 

 tions, he, under date of December 17, 1890, offered to submit the whole question in 

 dispute to arbitration; if Her Majesty's Government, however, would accept his 

 proposal that within a zone of 60 miles surrounding the Pribilof Islands all pelagic seal- 

 ing should be prohibited throughout the year, then he was directed to say that our 

 Government would deem that extent of protection full, ample, and all that we desired. 



Elliott protests, and calls attention to the fact that the "60-mile zone" is utterly 

 insufficient — that he had told Mr. Blaine in November, but that the whole of Bering 

 Sea, at least, must be closed to pelagic killing, since the seals went at frequent inter- 

 vals 200 miles away from the islands for fish all through the breeding season. 



1891: Lord Salisbury accepts Mr. Blaine's proposal for arbitrating, as outlined in 

 the letter of December 17 aforesaid; he also insisted upon the adoption of Elliott's 

 modus vivendi, which Mr. Blaine had ignored; public opinion and Mr. Elliott's 

 exposure of this attempt of Mr. Blaine to let the land and sea butchers have full 

 swing while the lawyers were arbitrating caused President Harrison to overrule Blaine 

 and order up the modus vivendi; June 14, 1891, it is agreed upon and proclaimed in 

 "Washington. 



A joint commission is sent to the Pribilof Islands; Sir George Baden-Powell and 

 Dr. George M. Dawson for Canada; C. Hart Merriam and Thomas C. Mendenhall for 

 the United States. 



The United States commissioners stay just nine days on the islands. 



The British commissioners spend 23 days on the islands, then visit the Russian seal 

 islands; they meet the United States agents in Washington, and in — 



1892: Go into conference and fail to agree on a single fact other than the perfunctory 

 statement that ' 'the seals are greatly diminished at the hands of man." 



The Bering Sea Tribunal of Arbitration is constituted February 29, 1892, and termed 

 the ' 'treaty of Washington," etc.; the Elliott modus vivendi of 1891 is ordered again 

 for 1892. 



1893: The award of the Bering Sea Tribunalis made August 16 at Paris; it denies 

 our claims, but prescribes a series of rules and regulations to govern the taking of fur 

 ieals at sea; our agents claim that they "have secured a great victory" and that 

 "pelagic sealing has been practically abolished in these regulations." Elliott alone 

 publicly dissents, and declares that ' 'these rules are utterly idle and useless — that 

 they do not protect but facilitate the destruction of the herd. ' ' [See New York Times, 

 Tribune, August 17, 1893.] 



1894: The rules of the Bering Sea Tribunal are put into effect April 24; by the end 

 of November the complete failure of their working to serve this purpose for which they 

 were enacted is self-confessed by the enormous and vastly increased catch of the 

 pelagic hunters for this season, which breaks the highest records known since this 

 industry was first really organized in 1886. 



On December 11, 1894, Mr. Dingley, stung by this record of perfect failure, reads a 

 letter to the House of Representatives addressed to him by Henry W. Elliott, detail- 

 ing the causes for this failure of these regulations, etc.; he announces to the House 



