84 
BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
so ruthlessly hunted and harassed, shortly after Steller’s observations in 1742, then they soon repaired, 
or rather most of the survivors did, to the shelter and isolation of the Prihylov group, which was 
wholly unknown to man. 
As will be shown in the historical itart of this report (p. 90), the seals, as a mat- 
ter of fact, never fled from the islands of Bering and Copper, and Elliott’s statement 
rests on a misapprehension. In the very year 1780, when Pribylof first discovered the 
islands which now bear his name, there returned to Kamchatka two vessels, loaded 
with fur-seal skins which could only have been taken on the Commander Islands, 
viz, one belonging to Protassof, “the cargo consisting chiefly of fur-seals,” and one 
belonging to Shelikof, with no less than 18,000 seal skins. Pribylof, with his cargo 
of over 31,000 seals from the new islands, did not return until several years later. 
The other exj)lanation offered by some of those who ascribe the decrease of the 
seals on the rookeries to the interference by the sealing at sea, rests on an assumption 
that the sealers, by stationing themselves at intervals across the path of the seals on 
their northward migration, actually cut the seals off from the islands, thus forcing them 
to go elsewhere, or, in the case of those finally reaching the islands, materially delaying 
them on the way. It would seem that to anyone who has seen the way in which 
seals travel during their migrations it would be plain that it would be impossible for 
many times the number of sealing schooners now in existence to effectually block the 
progress of the migrating herds. It may well be that the positions of the schooners 
if plotted on the charts would show them to thus stretch across the path of the seals 
(it has been so asserted in Eussian reports), and the large marks on the chart may 
well convey such an impression, but at sea the thing is quite different.’ 
This last explanation hints at the other alleged change in the habits of the seal, 
viz, an increasing lateness in the arrival of the bulk of the seals and a corresponding 
lateness in many of the jjhenomena of seal life on the islands. It is utterly incon- 
ceivable, however, that the sealers can even delay the bulk of the migrating herds 
materially, and the exi^lanation, therefore, would not explain, even if the allegations 
of the increasing lateness of the phenomena alluded to could be substantiated, and in 
my opinion they can not. 
A glance at the table of seals killed on North Eookery, Bering Island, during the 
season of 1895 (p. 110) shows that nearly one-third of the total number of skins was 
obtained between the 22d of August and the 13th of September (the skins being 
sliipped September 16) ; in other words, during 1895 nearly one-third of the skins was 
taken after the time when the skins were usually shipped. Thus, in 1891 the skins 
were shipped August 27 ; in 1893, August 22 ; in 1892, August 24. The earlier records 
to which I have had access are rather incomplete, but from 1877 to 1882 the seal skins 
were shipped from the North Eookery, Bering Island, on the following dates: 
1877 
1878 
1879 
Aug. 26 
Aug. 16 
Aug. 29 
1880 
1881 
1882 
Aug. 20 
Aug. 13 
Aug. 16 
It will be seen that even in the palmiest days of the rookeries, long before the 
advent of the pelagic sealers, the shipping dates do not differ materially from those 
‘ For the contemplation of those who believe in the schooners being able to cordon the sea so as 
to actually intercept lie seals, I sulmiit the following: In the latter part of .Inly, 1892, to the end of 
August, uumerous schooners killed seals south of Copper Island. If the jiositiou of the daily catches 
of eight of theiii he plotted down on a chart, it will be seen that they covered ]>retty evenly an area 
of 13,000 square nautical miles (roughly speaking). As their combined catch amounted to about 4,000 
skins, it is plain that they secured about one seal on every 3 square miles (see map, pi. 1). 
