158 
IN FORBIDDEN SEAS 
about. Soon after this the schooner came along 
and took them off. Gannon died on board shortly 
afterwards. The Japanese who ran away with the 
boat were never again heard of ; they were probably 
lost in a tide-rip in attempting to reach some other 
island. The Shiashikotan party secured eight otters, 
and that on Matau two, these ten otters costing the 
lives of six men. The North Star was very unfortu¬ 
nate, having now but one hunter, who was of little 
use. The spare hunter I had from the Dido would 
not join her, so the captain was obliged to sail down 
to Yetorup to try to obtain some men from the 
Eliza and Dido's crews to make up his complement. 
To return to our own experiences. In June, 
July, August, and September, our catches num¬ 
bered ten, thirty-two, eight, and six otters, respec¬ 
tively. We had no more hunting, and October 7 
saw us in our old anchorage in South-East Bay, 
Shikotan, where we aired skins and cleaned up, 
sailing on the 10th for Yokohama. During the 
voyage we had lowered for hunting eighty-one 
times, and spent 670 hours in the boats, pulling 
over 2,010 miles of water in securing our catch of 
eighty otters. 
For the hunting season of 1880 we sailed on 
April 12 from Yokohama, and twelve days later 
anchored in Roko Bay, Yetorup, where we landed 
Captain Miller and his party of carpenters and 
labourers, with their stores and gear, for repairing 
and getting off the schooner Eliza , which had lain 
there high and dry since the previous year. In 
May and June we secured 23 and 31 otters respec¬ 
tively, pulling the boats a distance of over 789 miles. 
On June 12 my third hunter nearly came to grief. 
