The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1894-11-21
THE VALUABLE FUR SEAL.
AN ANIMAL OVER WHICH GOVERN
MENTs HAVE ARBITRATED.
Princely Royalty Derived by the
United states From seals Killed
A Remarkable Creature.

n Remarkable Creature.
TTHE fur seal Its name should
be furry sea lion) is the most
celebrated of all our fur
bearers, and the United States
Government has been as active in pro-
tecting it from destruction as it was
Indifferent to the fate of the buffalo
millions. If our great international
dispute with England and Canada
over the fur seal had arisen seventy
years ago, before the days of peaceful
arbitration, there would surely have
been a war over it. Nor is our inter
est in our fur seal to be wondered at
when we stop to consider that from
1870 to 1890 our National Treasury
received Sc, 900, 900 from the Alaska
Commercial Company as royalty on
the animals killed (six-sevenths OF the
purchase price of Alaska). When to
this we add the amount received in
twenty per cent. import duty on the
dressed skins as they came back to us
from the English dyers, the total
revenue derived from the fur seal in
twenty years amounts to the enor-
nous sum of $S,500,000. Such an
animal was worth saving from destruc-
tion. No other quadruped ever be-
came such bone of conteption be-
tween two great nations for a long
period, the discussion winding up
with high and mighty conference OF
arbitration.
AS usual, the whole trouble arose
through the greediness of a few ire
sponsible and lawless individuals. The
sealers of the Pacific coast insisted
upon taking fur seals by shooting
them in the open sea, by which waste
full process seven were lost for every
three secured. But if it we're not for
the loss of money revenue derived
from this animal, it is quite certain
the Government would have allowed
the wasteful slaughter to go on until
the last seal was dead.
The fur seal Is not true seal by
any means, but sea lion, with naked,
paddle-shaped fippers and tiny ears.
1t is about two-thirds the size of the
Zalophus, and is therefore the small
est member of the sea-lion family.
Mr.. Elliott gives the average length
of the full-grown male animal as SIX
| feet from nose to tail, and weight
from $50 to 500 pounds. The average
length of the adult female is trlle
over four feet, and weight from sixty
two to seventy-five pounds When
dry, the coat is of dark, steel gray
color, and only the coarse, still outer
hair is visible. Underneath this lies
dense coat of very fine and soft
light-brown fur, in which lies oil the
value of the skin. In preparing the
pelt, the coarse outer hair is entirely
removed, and the underlying fur II
dyed a shiny, lustrous black, ano
sheared down very evenly. For som'
mysterious reason, we, the people o
"Yankee ingenuity" are actually un
able to dye seal fur successfully, and thi'
work is from sheer necessity sent t'
England. When it comes back, there
is a high rate of duty to pay, which IL
addition to the original royalty OF
$40. % paid 10 the Government by the
| North American Commercial Company
for every skin taken, the very ionf
bill of transportation charges, labor
and profits all along the line, from the
back of the seal to that of the tortu
nate wearer, accounts for the price o.
from $3.50 to 5000 on a seal ski
cloak.
In its habits the fur seal is re-
markable creature. With 6OOO miles
of coast to land upon if it chose, hi
strange and perverse animal now re
fuses to set hipper upon any portion
of the whole North American contl
nent, island or mainland, save thu
two little dots of land in Bering Sea
st. Paul, and st. George Islands
known to the world collectively as th'
Pribilof Islands. St. Paul is sever
miles by fourteen, and st. George i
only five and half by thirteen.
And yet, when Mr.. Elliott made III
careful and elaborate surveys OF al
the "rookeries, or herding ground
on those islands, in July, 1873, an'
laboriously calculated the number o
their fin footed inhabitants, he toun(
there the astonishing number OF D.
1893, ,42O fur seals. Like sheep IN
pen, they actually crowded one anothe
ON the sloping shores of sand, or waite
worn boulders, or tables OF slaty blu'
basalt. Each burly old male appears
a giant beside the females AMI younG
males gathered around him. st. Mich