sian islands in Behring Sea. Of the remainder, the larger part are taken in Behring Sea, although such taking, at least on such a scale, in that quarter is a comparatively recent thing. But if the killing of the fur seal there with fire-arms, nets, and other destructive implements were permitted, hunters would abandon other and exhausted places of pursuit for the more productive field of Behring Sea, where extermination of this valuable animal would also rapidly ensue. It is manifestly for the interests of all nations that so deplorable a thing should not be allowed to occur. As has already been stated, on the Pribyloff Islands this Government strictly limits the number of seals that may be killed under its own lease to an American company; and citizens of the United States have, during the past year, been arrested and ten American vessels seized for killing fur seals in Behring Sea. England, however, has an especially great interest in this matter, in addition to that which she must feel in preventing the extermination of an animal which contributes so much to the gain and comfort of her people. Nearly all undressed fur-seal skins are sent to London, where they are dressed and dyed for the market, and where many of them are sold. It is stated that at least 10,000 people in that city find profitable employment in this work; far more than the total number of people engaged in hunting the fur seal in every part of the world. At the Pri byloff Islands it is believed that there are not more than 400 persons so engaged; at Commander Islands, not more than 300; in the Northwest coast fishery, not more than 525 Índian hunters and 100 whites; and in the Cape Horn fishery, not more than 400 persons, of whom perhaps 300 are Chilians. Great Britain, therefore, in co-operating with the United States to prevent the destruction of fur seals in Behring Sea would also be perpetuating an extensive and valuable industry in which her own citizens have the most lucrative share. I inclose for your information copy of a memorandum on the fur-seal fisheries of the world, prepared by Mr. A. Howard Clark, in response to a request made by this Department to the U. S. Fish Commissioner. I inclose also, for your further information, copy of a letter to me, dated December 3d last, from Mr. Henry W. Elliott, who has spent much time in Alaska, engaged in the study of seal life, upon which he is well known as an authority. I desire to call your especial attention to what is said by Mr. Elliott in respect to the new method of catching the seals with nets. As the subject of this dispatch is one of great importance and of immediate urgency, I will ask that you give it as early attention as possi ble. T. F. BAYARD. I am, etc., [Inclosure 1 in No. 782.] Review of the fur-seal fisheries of the world in 1837. BY A. HOWARD CLARK. In the Encyclopædia Britannica, ninth edition, the fur-seal fisheries are credited with an annual yield of 185,000 skins, of which 100,000 are said to be obtained from the Pribyloff Islands, 30,000 from the Commander Islands, 15,000 from the straits of Juan de Fuca and vicinity, 12,000 from the Lobos Islands, 15,000 from Patagonia and outlying islands, 500 from the Falkland Islands, 10,000 from the Cape of Good Hope and places thereabout, and 2,500 from islands belonging to Japan. The above statistics were communicated by me to the author of the article "Seal Fisheries" in the Encyclopædia and had been carefully verified by the latest official records and by a personal interview with Messrs. C. M. Lampson & Co., of London, one of the principal fur houses of the world, and by whom most of the annual production of fur seal-skins are placed upon the market. A review of the subject at this time (January, 1988) necessitates but a slight change in the annual production and in the apportionment to the several fisheries. Some of the fisheries have increased while others have decreased. Taking the average annual yield from 1880 to date, I find that the total production is now 192,457 skins, obtained as follows: Annual yield of fur-seal fisheries. Pribyloff Islands, Behring Sea... Commander Islands and Robben Reef.. Islands belonging to Japan. British and American sealing fleets on northwest coast of America (including catch at Cape Flattery and Behring Sea). Lobos Islands at mouth of Rio de la Plata... Cape of Good Hope, including islands in Southern Indian Ocean. Cape Horn region.. Falkland Islands.. Total........ Fur-seal skins. 94, 967 41,893 The statistics for the Pribyloff and Commander Islands are compiled from reports of the Alaska Commercial Company, Mr. Elliott's reports in volume 8, Tenth Census, and in section 5, U. S. Fish Commission report, and trade reports of annual sales in London (Fur Trade Review, published monthly at No. 11 Bond street, New York). The northwest coast statistics are from the annual reports of the department of fisheries of Canada and from Mr. Swan's report in section 5, volume 2, of the quarto report of the U. S. Fish Commission. For Japan, Lobos Islands, Cape of Good Hope, and Falkland Islands the statistics are from the "Annual Statements of the Trade of the United Kingdom with foreign countries and British possessions as presented to Parliament." Statistics for Cape Horn region are from sealing merchants of Stonington and New London, Conn. The details of the fisheries for a series of years are shown in the following table: (As to the number of persons employed, it is not possible to give details in all cases. At Pribyloff Islands in 1880 there were 372 Aleuts and 18 whites. At Commander Islands there are about 300 persons; in the northwest coast fishery 523 Indian hunters and 100 whites, and in the Cape Horn fishery about 400 whites, of whom perhaps 300 are Chilians.) Number of fur-seal skins from principal fisheries, 1871 to 1887. The second point upon which information is requested is "that of the destruction of the fur seal, resulting either in its extermination or the diminution of its yield, in places where it formerly abounded,” etc. At the beginning of the present century there were great rookeries of fur seal at Falkland Islands, at the South Shetlands, at Masafuera, at South Georgia, and at many other places throughout the Antarctic region. These places were visited by sealing vessels, and indiscriminate slaughter of the animals resulted in the extermination of the species or in such diminution in their numbers that the fishery became unprofitable. The details of the Antarctic fishery are given in section 5, volume 2, of the quarto report of the U. S. Fish Commission, pages 400-467; in report by H. W. Elliott on "Seal Islands of Alaska," 6, 117-124 (reprinted in volume 8, Tenth Census Reports); in "Monograph of North American Pinnipeds," by J. A. Allen (Misc. Pub. XIÍ, U. S. Geological Survey); in "Fanning's Voyages Round the World" (New York, 1833); in "Narrative of Voyages and Travels in Northern and Southern Hemispheres," by Amasa Delano (Boston, 1817); and in numerous other works, to which reference will be found in the above volumes. * A few men are still living who participated in the Antarctic seal fisheries years ago. Their stories of the 1ormer abundance of fur seals I have obtained in personal interviews. As to the manner of destruction there is but one thing to say. An indiscriminate slaughter of old and young, male and female, in a few years results in the breaking up of the largest rookeries, and, as in the case of Masafuera and the Falkland Islands, the injury seems to be a permanent one. As an instance, the South Shetlands were first visited in 1819, when fur seals were very abundant; two vessels in a short time securing full fares. In 1820, thirty vessels hastened to the Islands, and in a few weeks obtained upwards of 250,000 skins, while thousands of seals were killed and lost. In 1821 and 1822 Weddell says "320,000 skins were taken. The system of extermination was practiced, for whenever a seal reached the beach, of whatever denomination, he was immediately killed and his skin taken, and by this means, at the end of the second year, the animals became nearly extinct; the young having lost their mothers when only three or four days old, of course died, which at the lowest calculation exceeded 100,000." In subsequent years, until 1845, these islands were occasionally visited by vessels in search of seal skins, but never after 1822 were many animals found there. About 1845 the Antarctic fur sealing was abandoned. In 1871 the industry was renewed, and a few vessels secured some valuable furs from the South Shetlands, but in a few years voyages there became unprofitable. (See section 5, volume 2, U. S. Fish Commissioner's Report, pp. 402-458.) The same story may be told of Masafuera, from which island about 3,500,000 fur-seal skins were taken between the years 1793 and 1807 (see section 5, as above, p. 407). Captain Morrell states that in 1807 "the business was scarcely worth following at Masafuera, and in 1824 the island, like its neighbor Juan Fernandez, was almost entirely abandoned by these animals." (Morrell's Voyage: New York, 1832, p. 130.) Scarcely any seals have since been found at Masafuera. Delano states that in 1797 there were two or three million fur seals on that island. Elliott, in his report, already cited, gives accounts of earlier voyages to Masafuera, etc. I have consulted log-books and journals of several voyages, all agreeing in the former abundance and the extermination of the fur seal on Masafuera as well as on other Antarctic or southern islands. At the Falkland Islands both fur seals and sea lions abounded, but there, too, they were destroyed. The sealing business at South Georgia was most prosperous in 1800, during which season sixteen American and English vessels took 112,000 fur-seal skins. Though not as important a rookery as some of the other islands, considerable numbers of fur seals have been taken from South Georgia. Since 1870 some good cargoes of elephantseal oil have been taken there. Fur seals were abundant at the Tristan d'Acunha Islands at the beginning of the century, and because of the almost inaccessible caves and rocks to which they resort, a few have survived, or least as late as 1873 a few were annually taken there. On the west coast of Africa, from Cape of Good Hope to 16° south latitude, there was until 1870 a considerable number of fur seals of an inferior quality, but they are now practically exhausted, the few skins marketed as coming from there being taken on various hauling grounds on islets farther south and east. (See Sec. 5, vol. 2, U. S. Fish Com. Report, p. 415.) The Prince Edward group, Crozet Islands, Kerguelen Land, and other smaller islands in the Southern Indian and Southern Pacific Oceans were important seal fisheries, both for the fur and elephant seal. At none of them is any number of seals found to-day. The English exploring ship Challenger visited Kerguelen Land in 1873-76, and reports: "Two of the whaling schooners met with at the island killed over seventy fur seals in one day and upwards of twenty at another, at some small islands off Howe Islands *Weddell's Voyages, p. 130, quoted in sec. 5, vol. 2, quarto report of U. S. F. C., p. 407. to the north. It is a pity that some discretion is not exercised in killing the animals, as is done at St. Paul Island, in Behring Sea, in the case of the northern fur seal. By killing the young males and selecting certain animals only for killing the number of seals even may be increased; the sealers in Kerguelen Island kill all they can find." (See "Report of the Scientific Results of the Exploring Voyage of H. M. S. Challenger, 1873-76. Narrative of the Cruise, vol 1, in two parts. 4°. Published by order of Her Majesty's Government, 1885.") In these volumes will be found similar references to other seal islands visited by the Challenger. In referring to Marion Island the report says: "The ruthless manner in which fur and elephant seals were destroyed by the sealing parties in the early part of this century has had the effect of almost exterminating the colony that used these desolate islands for breeding purposes." (Vol. I, p. 294.) To recapitulate, concerning seal rookeries south of the equator, I may say that there is no single place where any number are now known to resort, except on the Lobos Islands, off Peru, and at the mouth of the Rio de la Plata, and on the neighboring hauling grounds at the cliffs of Cabo Corrientes. Here they are and have long been protected by the Argentine Republic or Uruguay, and the rookery appears to remain about the same size, with little apparent increase or decrease in the number of animals, as may be seen by statistics of the catch in the table above given. The small rookeries or hauling grounds at Diego Ramirez Islands, Cape Horn, and the rocky islets in that vicinity, from 1870 to 1883 or 1884, yielded some return to the hardy sealers of Stonington and New London, Conn., from which ports a half dozen vessels have been annually sent. Even this last resort of American sealers is practically exhausted, and only by much search is a profitable voyage made there. Dr. Coppinger, who was at Cape Horn in 1878-82 (Cruise of the Alert, by R. W. Coppinger: London, 1883), tells of the difficulties of sealing at Cape Horn, and of the profits inade when even a few skins are secured. In 1880 Captain Temple "came through the western channels of Patagonia, having entered the straits at Tres Montes," and on the Cavadonga group of barren rocks he says he found some thousands of seals. Had the great southern rookeries been protected by Government it is altogether probable, according to all authorities, that they would to-day yield many thousands of skins, in some cases equal to the valuable returns of the Pribyloff group. In proceeding up the Southern Pacific from Masafuera we pass St. Felix, the Lobos Islands off Peru, and the Galapagos Islands, on which, as well as on other islands in that ocean, the fur seal once was found, but whence it has been exterminated. North of the equator we meet first the Guadaloupe Islands, where in 1878 there were a few fur seals, presumably migrations from the Pribyloff group. Moving northward along the Californian and northwest coast the fur seal is found in winter and early spring on its way to the great breeding grounds on the Pribyloff Islands. It is during this migration that the Pacific sealing schooners of British Columbia and San Francisco capture them, and it is probable that if the fleet increases in size with a corresponding increase in the number of seals taken, there will ere long be an appreciable decrease in the number of seals on the Pribyloff Islands. This can not but be the result, for many seals are killed and not secured, and there is the same indiscriminate slaughter as regards young and old, male and female, that was practiced at the southern rookeries. The statistics showing the present growing condition of the northwest coast fishery and the efforts of the fishermen to follow the seals even into Behring Sea are already a matter of record and need not be repeated here except to refer to the annual reports of the department of fisheries of Canada. In the report for 1886 will be found (on page 249) the names of the British Columbian fleet, aggregating 20 vessels manned by 79 sailors and 380 hunters, and their catch is given at 38,917 skins as compared with 13 vessels taking 17,700 skins in 1882. The American vessels in this fleet in 1880 and their catch is given by Mr. Swan in section 5, volume 2, of the quarto report of U. S. Fish Commission. It is not necessary that I refer to the condition of the rookeries on the Pribyloff Islands. There can be no question concerning the advisability of regulating the number of animals to be killed and the selection of such animals as will not interfere with the breeding of the species. The history of the islands at the beginning of the century, when there was an indiscriminate slaughter of fur seals, and the protection of the animals in 1808 and thereafter by the Russian and American Governments is fully told by Veniaminov and by Elliott, and need not be repeated here. (Veniaminov's Zapieskie, etc.; St. Petersburg, 1842; volume 2, pp. 568, quoted by H. W. Elliott in Seal Islands of Alaska, pp. 140-145, volume 8, Tenth Census Report.) The Commander Islands (Behring and Copper Islands), in Behring Sea, and Robben Reef, near Saghalien, in the Okhotsk Sea, are leased by the Alaska Commercial Company, and are protected by the Russian Government in much the same manner that the Pribyloff Islands are protected by the United States Government. A description of the seal industry on those islands is given by Professor Nordenskiold in Voyage of the Vega, a translation of a portion of his report being given by Mr. Elliott on pages 109-115, in Seal Islands of Alaska. At Robben Reef it is impossible to establish a station, the rock being often wave-washed, but the Alaska Company send men there in the season to gather from 1,500 to 4,000 skins each year. The agent of the Russian Government confers with the Alaska Company's agent each year to determine the number of skins that shall be taken in the Commander Islands. The seals taken by the Japanese are those migrating from the Commander group and are not secured in large numbers, the average being about 4,000, though some years as many as 11,000 are taken. SCHEDULE A.-Memorandum of seal-skin seizures, vessels, etc., in Behring Sea, in 1887. Arrival of sealing schooners from Behring Sea in 1887, as far as reported to October 5, 1887 Recapitulation, as reported up to October 5, 1887: Skins seized, 11,969; skins landed, 17,242; total, 29,211. |