The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1890-08-17


three-mile strip of water along the Alaskan
shore is not broad enough to comprehend the |
whole of Behring Sea. Unless Great Britain |
will make fair and reasonable agreement to |
make the Canadian let our seals alone, wherever !
they may happen to be, the only strategic course
open to the Government of the United States |
seems to be TO wait for the next return of the
seals to the Pribylov Islands, then build palt-
sade or n fence of some kind around the islands !
which would keep the seals always within our
undisputed jurisdiction
After all, what is this Behring Sea- and what
is this fur-seal that England and the United
States are quarreling so vehemently about?
Behring Sea is about the size of Alaska, and
as for Alaska, the whole of New England could
be stored away in one corner of the Territory
The late Governor Swineford in one of his an
nual reports said Sitka was further away from
some parts of Alaska than it was from Portland
Me. The Seal Islands of Behring Sea are four in
number. Two, the Prbylov Islands-St. George
and st. Paul-belong to the United States, and
two, the Commander Misunderstanding and Cop
per-belong to Russia. The Russian Islands are
on the Siberian side, the American islands are on
the Alaskan side of Behring Sea. The islands
that lie scattered all over that sea are hundreds
of miles apart. Even theislands in the Aleutian
chain, which on the map looks like row of
stepping stones between Alaska and Siberia, are
hundreds of miles apart. st. Paul and st.
George are 192 miles distant from the near
est island and farther from the nearest
point on the Alaskan Coast Oonalaska is the
nearest settlement to the Seal Islands. 1t is on
one of the Aleutian Islands, about equally dis
tant from St. George and the mainland All
vessels going northward to the Seal Islands or
to any other point on the American side of
Behring Sea pass by Oonalaska The islands
lie w. n. w. from all points on the Pacific
Coast The distance of st. George from Kodiak
is $50 miles, from Sitka 400 from Vancouvers
Island 800, from San Francisco $3.50.
| The most complete account of the Seal Islands
of Alaska is to be found In a monograph written
BY Henry w. Elliott, of the Smithsonian Insti-
tuition, for the tenth census, which was after
! ward enlarged and reprinted at the Government
| Printing Office in this city, and issued as
| special bulletin under the auspices of the late
| Professor Spencer F. Baird, then United States
! Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries.
Mr.. Elliott put in several seasons on the Seal
Islands between the years 1872 and 1876 making
| observations and collections for this monograph
and the result is still the recognized textbook
of the scientists. Mr. Elliott says that the rea
son why the seal rookeries of the North are
confined to four islands is that there are no
other suitable grounds in the North. The South
American coasts and the islands that there
abound afford an unlimited extent of ground
suitable for seal rookeries and to a certain eX-
tent the seals avail themselves of it, but not
nearly as much now as formerly. The indis-
criminate slaughter of century has driven the
fur-seal almost out of the Antarctic waters and
away from the South American rookeres.
Fine breeding grounds to which the seals
used to resort by the million are all along the
coasts of Chilli, Bolivia, Peru, Western Patago-
mia, aud Terra del Fuego. The rookeries on
the islands of ST. Felix and Juan Fernandez were
very celebrated in their time. The Falkland
Islands when opened up by Capt. Cook in the
last century fairly swarmed with fur-seas. But
instead Of the millions that once existed there
reports say there is but an insignificant number
now. The only rookery of any consequence on
the South American coast now, and the only
one which receives any fostering care, is little
cliff-bound rookery which is owned and farmed
out by the Argentine Republic at Cape Cori-
entes, and the take at this rookery is restricted
to about three thousand skins year. The seal
skins of the world are now obtained from the
seals that annually resort to Behring Sea for
breeding purposes.
According to Mr.. Elliott, the indiscriminate
slaughter of the seal was continued in the South
seas until the species was pretty nearly extin-
guished, and the few millions remaining took
flight for the North Pacific. The slaughter
alluded to is attributed mostly to English fisher
men.
1t was in 1856 that Gehrman Pribyloo ships
mate in the employ of one of the many Russian
, companies then engaged in the fur business,
discovered the islands now under consideration.
st. Paul, the larger island of the two, has an
area of about thirty-three square miles. The
annual killing of the seals is the only business
done on the islands. The work is done by 8
colony of Aleuts, who are employed by the com
pany which holds the contract with the United
z States Government Under the old contract the
I number of seals which the Alaska Commercial
Company was allowed to kill was rs 900 on st
Paul and $4,000 on St. George, making 100, ,OOt
altogether The law gives the Secretary of the
Treasury power to change the limit wheneve
he sees fit, and the new contractors, under tn,
= lease which was awarded few weeks ago, will
not be permitted to kill as many. The Aleut
get forty cents apiece for taking the skins
: which makes their pay very good during tn
working season, but the season is short one
! from forty to fifty days rule In the sum
mer of 1878, for instance, seventy-one men work
- ing forty days secured $4,000 skins on the isanC
Z of st. Paul.
i The "season" on the Pribylov Islands begin
! in May and closes in September. The bulls be
= GIN to arrive the first week in May. The COW
p do not follow for six weeks later That perio
is spent in one continuous fight for comfortabl
places. From the middle of June till the mid
= die of July the COWS keep arriving. The aver
Q age bull weighs about five hundred pounds an
a the average COW about eighty. The bulls com
. to the islands at the beginning Of the season ia
r and sleek and 90 away at the close lean and haa
r, gard The females bear single pup each, an
d it is invariably born soon after the female lands
The breeding season is at its height the secon
week in July and subsidies entirely at the begiI
e ming of August. BY the middle of Septembe
i, the young pups are all able to swim, the rool
70 cries are broken up, and the season is oyel
e Although individual straggers remain benin
~ till the cid of the year the general crowd pac
~ up and strike out for winter quarters before th
a. emu OF September, just as it is customary to d
t at other summer waterng-places,
Mr. Elliott calculates that in the year lS7
n there were, all told, about 4,700,000 seals o
e. Prbylov Islands, two-thirds of them breeder
N and his opinion then was that if the same regI
" lations were continued, and no more than OF
D, hundred thousand male seals between the age
of five years and one were killed every yea
there would be danger of eXtermnatinp III