... Page. 445 445 ... 445 ... Enormous rental and profits received by United States from the islands... Marvellous increase of seals in spite of depredations referred to 1869, 1,728,000-1874, 4,700,000-1884, increasing-1885, no change; countless numbers-1887, still on the increase-1888, no change. With total of 4,700,000 in 1874, Lieutenant Maynard of opinion 112,000 young male seals can be safely killed annually Reference to Maynard's and Bryant's Report as to habits of seals supports Canadian ... Canadian Government contends few females in calf ever taken in sea Rookeries full to July 25, and remain in limits Canadian contention supported by Report on International Fisheries Exhibition ... ... ... Mr. McIntyre's Report as to habits of seals, 1869 Mr. Williams points out insufficiency of protection to islands... Mr. Bryant shows the value of the lease in conferring a monopoly-Mr. Moore illustrates this When the Company took less than 100,000 seals it did so because the market did not demand them Mr. McIntyre shows that 800,000 were once thrown into the sea as worthless when Man's assaults at sea small in comparison to the natural enemies of the seal ... ... 450 Mr. Tupper to Sir J. Pauncefote. Dear Sir Julian, The Arlington, Washington, March 8, 1890. I have the honour to inclose herewith a Memorandum prepared by me in reply to the Memorandum sent to you by Mr. Blaine, and which you handed to me upon the 3rd instant. I send you a copy for yourself, one for Mr. Blaine, and one for M. de Struve, the Russian Ambassador. I also have the honour to forward herewith a valuable paper upon the subject, prepared hurriedly by the Assistant Director of the Geological Survey of Canada, George Dawson, D.S., F.G.S., F.R.S.C., F.R.M.S. I may add that Dr. Dawson was in charge of the Yukon Expedition in 1887. Copies of his paper are also inclosed for Mr. Blaine and M. de Struve. Memorandum on Mr. Blaine's Letter to Sir Julian Pauncefote, dated March 1, 1890. In the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's letter of the 1st March, on the third page, is an extract from a Report to the House of Representatives, as follows: "In former years fur-seals were found in great numbers on various islands of the South Pacific Ocean, but after a comparatively short period of indiscriminate slaughter the rookeries were deserted, the animals having been killed or driven from their haunts." While it is admitted that indiscriminate slaughters upon the rookeries are most injurious to the maintenance of seal life, it is denied that in the history of the fur-seal industry any instance can be found where a rookery has ever been destroyed, depleted, or even injured by the killing of seals at sea only. Mr. Elliott, who is quoted by Mr. Blaine, admits that the rookeries in the South Pacific withstood attacks of the most extensive and destructive character for twenty years, when young and old males and females were indiscriminately knocked on the head upon their breeding-grounds; and Mr. Clark (H. R. Report No. 3883, 50th Congress, 2nd Session, p. 91) tells us that in 1820 thirty vessels on the islands (South Shetlands) took in a few weeks 250,000 skins, while thousands were killed and lost. In 1821 and 1822, 320,000 skins were taken, and 150,000 young seals destroyed. None of these islands, however, were ever frequented by the millions which have been found on the Pribylov group for over twenty years. "These islands constitute the most valuable rookery or breeding-place of these animals ever known to man." (H. R. Report 3883, 50th Congress, pp. 111, 112, Hon. C. A. Williams' written statement.) Professor Elliott (in his evidence, p. 142) mentions one person who, when with him at the islands, estimated the number at 16,000,000. The Report of the Congressional Committee on the Alaska seal fisheries states that indiscriminate slaughter in the early part of the nineteenth century caused a desertion of the rookeries, and it goes on to say that in 1820 and 1821, 300,000 were taken in an indiscriminate fashion at the South Shetlands, and, at the end of the second year, the species had there been almost exterminated. The Honourable C. A. Williams, whose evidence is cited and relied upon by Mr. Blaine, supports this view (see p. 111, H. R. Report No. 3883, 50th Congress); but, as a matter of fact, while seals are admittedly not so plentiful in South Shetlands as heretofore, owing to wholesale destruction on the breeding-grounds, so prolific are they that, in 1872, 8,000 skins of "the choicest and richest quality were obtained from these islands. In the next season 15,000 skins were taken there, and in 1874, 10,000 skins, and from 1870 to 1880 the sealing fleet brought home 92,756 fur-seal skins from the South Shetlands, and the vicinity of Cape Horn and Tierra del Fuego." (A. Howard Clark, p. 402, Commission of Fisheries, Fishery Industries United States, section 5, vol. ii, 1887.) In this regard, it may here be noted that this extract refers only to the catch of sealers which fitted out at New London, Connecticut, and does not embrace the operations of sealers from other countries. Mr. Clark describes the manner in which the seals at Mas-á-Fuera were attacked. At p. 407 of the article above cited he points out that between the years 1793 and 1807, 3,500,000 seals were obtained from this island by English and American vessels, and in 1824 the island was "almost abandoned by these animals." Mr. Clark also shows that in 1797 there were only 2,000,000 on the islands, and yet in seven years more than 3,000,000 were carried from the islands to Canton, China. Mention is made, too, of fourteen ships' crews on the island at one time killing seals. At p. 408 mention is made of from twelve to fifteen crews on shore at the same time (American and English), and that "there were constantly more or less of ships' crews stationed here for the purpose of taking fur-seals' skins," from 1793 to 1807. It is contended by the Canadian Government that a reference to the history of this island is entirely beside the contention on the part of the United States that it is necessary to keep sealing craft hundreds of miles away from rookeries in order to preserve the seal life on the breeding-grounds. The cause of injury is the same in all the cases mentioned, and Mr. Chapel, in the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's letter, now under consideration, at p. 5 well says: "It is stated that at the Shetlands alone [which never equalled the present condition of the Pribylov group, mentioned by Hon. C. A. Williams, already quoted], 100,000 per annum might have been obtained and the rookeries preserved if taken under proper restrictions; but, in the eagerness of men, old and young male and female seals were killed, and little pups a few days old, deprived of their mothers, died by thousands on the beaches"-[it may here be observed that not a case of dead pups was ever found on the Pribylov group, so far as the Reports on the islands show]-carcases and bones strewed on the shores." This statement, cited in the United States' Case, is direct authority for the Canadian contention. It illustrates three important points: 1. That indiscriminate slaughter on the breeding-grounds is injurious and in time destructive. 2. That when the mothers are killed, the young pups, dying in consequence, are found on the island. 3. That Regulations of the number to be killed on the island, with careful supervision, will maintain the rookeries independently of prohibiting sealing in the waters. The Report of the House of Representatives states: "The only existing rookeries are those in Alaska, another in the Russian part of Behring's Sea, and a third on Lobos Island, at the mouth of the River Plate, in South America." The statement is incorrect. Important omissions occur, since the cases left out, when examined, show that, notwithstanding all of the extraordinary and indiscriminate slaughter of past years, it is possible, by careful supervision of the rookeries alone, and of the seals while on land, to revive, restore, and maintain lucrative rookeries. Quoting from an extract from a Russian Memorandum respecting the hunting of seals, communi cated by M. de Staal to the Marquis of Salisbury, and dated the 25th July, 1888, it is found that other rookeries are by no means deserted. The extract reads as follows: "The places where fur-seal hunting is carried on may be divided in two distinct groups. The first group would comprise Pribylov Islands, Behring's Sea, 100,000 killed in 1885; Commander Islands (Behring and Copper Islands, 45,000; Seal Islands, Okhotsk Sea, 4,000); total, 149,000. The second group, the sea near the coast of Victoria, 20,000; Lobos Islands, 15,000; islands near Cape Horn and the South Polar Sea, 10,000; islands belonging to Japan, 7,000; Cape of Good Hope, 5,000; total, 57,000." An important omission is the case of Cape of Good Hope, in reference to which the Committee of the House of Representatives, previous to their Report, had been informed (see H. R. Report No. 3883, 50th Congress, 2nd Session, p. 114) that from the Cape of Good Hope Islands, under protection of the Cape Government, a yearly supply of 5,000 to 8,000 skins is derived, and that from Japan, it was stated, sometimes 15,000 and sometimes 5,000 a-year are received. These islands are now rigidly protected by the Governments of the countries to which they belong; but neither does the Government of the Cape, of Japan, nor of Uruguay, in the case of the Lobos Islands, consider it necessary to demand the restriction of the pursuit of seals in the open sea. United States' vessels have visited the islands off the Cape of Good Hope from 1800 to 1835, and have taken on some days 500 to 700 skins, securing several thousands of skins annually. In 1830 Captain Gurdon L. Allyn, of Gale's Ferry, Connecticut, mentions finding 1,000 carcases of seals at one of the islands, the skins of which had been taken. He landed and took seals in considerable numbers. He was again on a sealing voyage on this coast in 1834, and shot seals on the rookeries. In 1828 a plague visited these rookeries, and 500,000 seals perished during the plague (Clark in the Report of the United States' Commission of Fish and Fisheries, 1887, section 5, vol. ii, pp. 415, 416), and yet to-day we find a renewal of the industry by Regulations applied solely to the rookeries, and exclusive of the deep-sea operations. Upon p. 7 of the Appendix now under review, the Report of the Congressional Committee on Alaska seal fisheries refers to testimony of United States' Government Agents regarding the number of seals shot and not secured, and a calculation is referred to, to the effect that one in every seven is alone secured by the hunter who follows seals on the sea. The experience of Canadian hunters is directly opposed to this theory, and shows that a loss of 6 per cent. is all that ever takes place, while Indian hunters seldom lose one. Solemn declarations to this effect have been made under the Canadian Statute relating to extra-judicial oaths. In confirmation of this, reference may be had to Mr. H. W. Elliott, in the United States' Fish Commissioner's Report, vol. ii, section 5, p. 489, where he says:— "The Aleuts fire at the otter at 1,000 yards range, and that, when hit in the head, nine times out of ten the shot is fatal." In the case of hunting the seals, the practice of the white hunters, all expert shots, is to paddle up to the seal while asleep in the water, shoot it in the head, and at once haul it into the boat; while the Indians approach it in a canoe and spear the seal, the head of the spear separating itself and being attached to a rope by which the seal is dragged into the canoe. Reference is made on p. 4 of the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's letter to the limitations in the lease of 1870. These conditions, it is contended, are most inconsistent with the present. view of the United States regarding the danger to the preservation of seal life. With respect to this the following facts should be carefully noted: 1. Up to 1862 no Law in Russia existed prohibiting or forbidding the killing of seals, and in that year an inoperative Law was promulgated. (See Russian Memorandum, M. de Staal to Lord Salisbury, 25th July, 1888.) Mr. McIntyre, a Special Agent of the Treasury Department (H. R. Ex. Doc. No. 36, 41st Congress, 2nd Session, p. 18), records the catch taken from the Pribylov Islands under the Russian-American Company, as follows: TABLE showing the Number of Fur-seals taken by the Russians on St. Paul and St. George Islands from 1817 to 1860. Referring to this Table, Mr. McIntyre says: "The number of seals on St. Paul Island is variously estimated at from 3,000,000 to 4,000,000, including all classes, and on St. George at about one-third as many. I think it may be safely stated that there are not less than 4,000,000 on the two islands. The Table from the records of the late Russian-American Company, appended to this Report, exhibits the number of seals taken from each island from 1817 to 1837, and from 1842 to 1860. Previously to 1817, says the late Bishop Veniamnoff, no records were kept. From the same authority we learn that during the first few years following the discovery of the islands in 1781 over 100,000 skins were annually obtained; bat this, it seems, was too large a number, for the decrease in the yearly return was constant until 1842, when they had become nearly extinct; and in the next decade the whole number secured was 129,178, being in 1852 but 6,564; but from 1842, under judicious management, there appears to have been an increase, and in 1858, 31,810 were taken, which was the largest catch in any one year, until 1867, when, as I am informed, some 80,000 or 100,000 were secured, under the supposition that the territory would soon be transferred to the United States. The decrease from 1817 to 1838,' says Bishop Veniamnoff, averaged about one-eighth of the whole number annually, so that in 1834 there were produced on both islands, instead of 60,000 to 80,000, only 15,751, and in 1837, 6,802.' From the most careful computation I have been able to make, I am of the opinion that no more than 100,000-75,000 on St. Paul and 25,000 on St. George-can be annually taken without incurring the risk of again diminishing the yearly production, as we observe the Russians to have done in former years." See also Wick, Chief of Land Service, Russian-American Telegraph Expedition, who reported in 1868 on undiminished condition of the seal fishery. (H. R. Ex. Doc. No. 177, 40th Congress, 2nd Session.) Six million seals had been taken from this sea between 1841 and 1870. (Vide Dall on “ Alaska and its Resources," 1870, p. 492.) 2. In 1868 Hutchinson and Morgan, the promoters and founders of the Alaska Commercial Company, and afterwards lessees of the islands, saw that, unless restrictions were imposed upon the islands, there would be ruin to the rookeries (H. W. Elliott, "Our Arctic Province," pp. 247, 248); consequently, by Act of Congress approved the 27th July, 1868, the killing of fur-seals on the islands was prohibited (W. H. McIntyre, Special Agent, Treasury Department, H. R. Ex. Doc. No. 36, 41st Congress, 2nd Session, p. 12). Notwithstanding the Act to which reference has been made, 50,000 were killed on St. George and 150,000 on St. Paul by traders in 1868 (Dall, p. 496), 100,000 in 1869 (W. H. McIntyre, H. R. Ex. Doc. No. 36, 41st Congress, p. 13). Mr. Wardman, an Agent of the United States' Treasury at the Seal Islands, in his "Trip to Alaska," published 1884, on p. 92, says: "General onslaught, threatening extermination, by American vessels during the interregnum of departure of Russian and installation of United States' Governments took place." And the same officer, in his sworn testimony given before the Congressional Committee, stated that 300,000 were killed in 1869. 3. Notwithstanding this condition of affairs, Secretary Boutwell reported in 1870 (H. R. Ex. Doc. No. 129, p. 2, 41st Congress, 2nd Session) that "if the animals are protected, it is probable that about 100,000 skins may be taken each year without diminishing the supply," and that "great care was necessary for the preservation of the seal fisheries upon the Islands of St. Paul and St. George." So Dall, in his book on Alaska (1870, p. 496), in referring to slaughter by Russians, believed that 100,000 seals could safely be killed annually under Regulations, and Mr. Blaine, in his despatch to Sir Julian Pauncefote of the 27th January, says: "In the course of a few years of intelligent and interesting experiment the number that could be safely slaughtered was fixed at 100,000 per annum." Mr. Boutwell, as will be seen on reference to his Report, was opposed to a lease, and remarked that it was necessary in any event to maintain in and around the islands an enlarged naval force for the protection of the same. This Report was followed by the legislation under which a lease was executed in May 1870. 4. In drawing the terms of the lease and Regulations concerning the islands the United States permitted, in the then state of affairs, the lessees to take 100,000 seals a-year for twenty years, and they were permitted to make up this number from any male seals of 1 year of age or over. 5. The natives were allowed to destroy on the islands pup seals of either sex for food, numbering in some years 5,000. 6. The 100,000 could be killed by the lessees in the months of June, July, September, and October. Upon p. 8 of the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's note the opinion of the Committee of House of Representatives is given to the effect that the protection of the islands is not enough, but that the seals must be protected in their annual migrations to and from the rookeries, and for 50 miles south-east of the rookeries to their feeding-grounds. This is a far different proposal from that submitted by the Secretary of State, since it does not embrace the whole of the Behring's Sea, but locates the feedinggrounds, so called, within 50 miles of the islands. The other points, on p. 8 of the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's letter to Sir Julian Pauncefote of the 3rd instant, need hardly be dealt with in discussing the necessity for a close season, reference being made therein to the sorting of the herd for killing on land so as not to kill the females. This is admittedly wise, since the killing is done 14th June when the pups are being dropped. The rest of p. 8 of Mr. Blaine's Memorandum raises the point that a seal is not a fish. So on p. 9 testimony is cited touching the necessity for not killing females on the rookeries, when wholesale slaughter of 100,000 a-year goes on, and this is not here controverted. The opinion of Mr. Glidden, whose experience was confined to the land operations, regarding the proportion of seals recovered when shot in deep sea, cannot be of weight. It is, therefore, unnecessary to dwell upon the fact that he is a Government employé, giving his views in favour of his Government's contention in 1888, after the seizures of 1885 had taken place. This officer was on St. George Island from the 25th May to August in 1881 only. His opinion that an "open policy" would not preserve the value of the seal fisheries, and that it is necessary to protect the seals in Behring's Sea, as well as on the islands, is not based upon much practical knowledge. He further stated that not much hunting was done in the Pacific. Honourable Mr. Williams, at p. 107 of Evidence before the Congressional Committee, says: "Three miles beyond land (in Pacific) you do not see them; where they go no one knows." The British Columbian sealers and the record of their catches in the Pacific for twenty years weakens the standing of these witnesses as experts. Mr. Taylor, another witness, ascribes to the fish of Behring's Sea a very high order of intelligence. He deposes that in Behring's sea the seals eat a great many fish every twenty-four hours, and as "the fish have become well aware of the fact that there is a good many seals on the Seal Islands, they keep far out to sea." He stands alone in testifying so positively to what can, at best, be a matter for conjecture, and he fails to show he had the slightest means of ascertaining this knowledge. He further stated that the bulls remain on the islands all summer. This is contradicted by writers and other United States' witnesses, as will be seen hereafter. It is, therefore, evident that this gentleman was testifying simply to his own peculiar theories regarding seal life upon very limited experience. He says, at one place, that while the cows are out (and they go, he tells us, 10 to 15 miles, and even further) the sealers catch them; while, at another place, he states: "The sea is black with them around the islands, where they pick up a good many seal, and there is where the killing of cows occurs when they go ashore." So that, evidently, he may have seen cows killed when around the islands, the only place at which he apparently could observe them, and he has merely conjectured the distance that they go from land and the number actually shot in deep water. This witness" thinks there is some damage done in killing and shooting of the cows and leaving so many young without their mothers." There would be less doubt respecting the cows being shot or lost if it was satisfactorily shown that large numbers of young pups were found dead in the rookeries. The witness, if able, would have certainly pointed to this. The reverse, however, is the fact; and, with the exception of one witness before the Congressional Committee, whose evidence will be examined again, not an Agent of the Government nor a writer ever stated that pups were found dead in any numbers on the islands from loss of mothers; the fact being that mothers never go far from their young until the young are well able to care for themselves. This witness, notwithstanding his allusion to supposed damage by the killing of mothers, the killing of cows by vessels in shore-where the sea is black with them-had to admit, "the number of seal, in the aggregate, is not apparently diminished." His knowledge is confined to one year (1881), and we have better and undisputed testimony that long after this a great increase had taken place an increase of millions. Mr. Taylor, it should be observed, however, gave other testimony than that quoted by Mr. Blaine. that "These predatory vessels are generally there (in Behring's Sea) in the spring of the year, when the cows are going to the island to breed ; ... most of the seals that are killed by these marauding vessels are cows with young." He estimates the number taken in 1881 at from 5,000 to 8,000. "These vessels will take occasion to hang around the islands, and when there is a heavy fog to go on the rookeries very often." The chief damage, according to Mr. Taylor, is not the killing of mothers out at sea when their young are on shore depending upon the return of their mothers, as is contended, but it is due, he says, to the insufficient protection of the island. This can, as will be pointed out, be remedied if the suggestions of Government Agents are acted upon in the line of better police guarding of the rookeries. Mr. Williams' testimony is next referred to on p. 10 of the Appendix to Mr. Blaine's letter. This gentleman was engaged in the whaling business for forty years (p. 73 of Evidence before Congressional Committee). As regards fur-seals, his knowledge is not based upon experience, but "from reading and from conversation with my captains" (p. 73). He was called by request of attorney for the Alaska Commercial Company, of which Mr. Williams was a stockholder. No importance, it is submitted, can be attached to his testimony regarding the habits and nature of the seal after such a frank confession. His evidence that females in pup mass together in the sea before landing may therefore be dismissed, since he does not produce any authority for a statement which is contradicted by expert testimony. Neither in his statement that hunters admit that out of eigut shots they would save one seal only correct. On pp. 11 and 12 of the Appendix Mr. Williams naturally gives his view for holding the control over seal life in Behring's Sea. It is not denied that every lessee of the Pribylov group would agree entirely with him in this. It may be remarked that he does not share the theory of the United States that the chief danger lies in killing the mothers when out in the deep sea for food, having left their nurslings on shore. At pp. 10, 11, and 12 of the Appendix Mr. Williams is quoted to show that the danger to the females lies in the journey through the Aleutian Islands, with young, to the breeding-grounds. On p. 90 of his Evidence before the Committee, he illustrates the ineffective means of protecting the rookeries by stating: "Last fall a schooner landed at one of the rookeries and killed seventeen cows and bulls right on the breeding rookeries." |