Deposition of Joseph Stanley-Brown, Treasury Agent.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

City of Washington, s8:

Joseph Stanley-Brown, being duly sworn, deposes and says:

I am 37 years of age; am a citizen of the United States; reside at Mentor, Ohio, and am by profession a geologist.

Experience.

I spent the entire season of 1891 upon the Pribilof Islands, and during the summer of 1892 again visited them and spent the period between June 9th and August 14th upon the islands of St. Paul and St. George in continuation of my investigations concerning seal life. This season, in addition to the continuous general examination of all the rookeries and the plottings of the breeding ground areas upon charts, certain special stations were selected at points within easy reach of the village and daily visits made thereto. This method of work gave me an excellent opportunity to make comparisons between the breeding areas of 1891 and those of 1892.

Breeding grounds.

As the result of my observations during the past season it is my opinion that there was no increase among the females-the producing class-but on the contrary that there was a perceptible falling off. This decrease was the more noticeable at points on the rookeries where the smaller groups of breeding seals are to be found.

There was so little driving during the season of 1892 that an excellent opportunity was given to observe life upon the hauling grounds, several of which were not disturbed during the entire season. There seemed to be a slight increase of the young bachelor seals, although this may have been more apparent than real from the fact that being unmolested they accumulated in large bands.

It is quite certain that the normal habit of the "holluschuckie" is to remain most of their time upon shore, and if left to themselves would spend more time there than in the water. I have kept a close daily watch upon groups of young males, the members of which did not go into the water for a week or ten days at a time.

Harems.

Any statement to the effect that the occasional occurrence of large harems indicates a decrease in the available number of virile males and hence deterioration of the rookeries, should be received with great caution, if not entirely ignored. The bulls play only secondary part in the formation of harems. It is the cow which takes the initiative. She is in the water beyond the reach or control of the male and can select her own point of landing. Her manner on coming ashore is readily distinguished from that of the young males which continuously play along the sea margin of the breeding grounds. She comes out of the water, carefully noses or smells the rocks here or there like a dog, and then makes her way to the bull of her own selecting. In this incipient stage of her career on shore there is but little interference on the part of the male, but once well away from the water and near the bull she has chosen, he approaches her, manifests his pleasure, and greetings are exchanged. She then joins the other cows and as soon as dry lies down and goes comfortably to sleep. I have seen this selective power exercised repeatedly and the result is that one bull will be especially favored while those within fifteen or twenty feet will be ignored.

The size of harems, therefore, has of itself but little to do with the question of lack of virile males, but indicates only the selective power 12364- -25

of the females. If 100 bulls represented the necessary supply of virile males we might, by reason of this fact, find 10 bulls with very large harems, 10 with still less, 50 with a reasonable number, 20 with a few, and 10 with none. An onlooker would not, therefore, be justified in stating that by reason of these few large harems there is a lack of virile males.

In the very nature of things it seems impossible that any method other than this one of selection on the part of the female could ever have existed.

Large harems are frequently due to topographic conditions, the configuration of the land being such that the females can only reach the breeding grounds through narrow passage ways between the rocks and around the terminations of which they collect.

Harems often coalesce; then boundaries become indefinite, and when their size and position make them too large for control cows pass to the rear and are appropriated by the bulls there.

When once the female is located, the bull exercises rigid control and permits no leaving of the land until she has been served. I never saw a harem so large that the vigilance of the bull in this respect was ever relaxed. His consorts may escape to another harem, but they are never permitted to go to sea until an inspection convinces the bull that they are entitled to do so. No intelligent observer would be so bold as to assert that during the season of 1892 there was not an abundance of males of competent virility, despite the occurrence of occasional large harems. The accompanying photographs show that even at the height of the season, and just previous to the disintegration of the breeding grounds, there were, unsupplied with cows, old males which had taken their stand and from which I was unable to drive them with stones.

I should have been extremely glad to have been able to note a great many more of these large harems, but the work of the pelagic hunter among the females has been so effective that the average size of the harems is growing smaller and smaller, while the number of idle bulls is steadily increasing. The rookeries of the Pribilof Islands will never be destroyed by a superabundance of large harems.

movements.

I arrived on the islands this year a few days after the coming of Females and their the first cows, and by selecting a small harem composed of seals the arrival of which I had seen, and giving it daily observation, I was able to satisfy myself that females begin to go into the water from 14 to 17 days after first landing. On first entering the sea they make a straight line for the outer waters, and as far as the eye can follow them they seem still to be travelling. The first cows to arrive are the first to depart in search of food, and by the first week in July the cows are coming and going with such frequency as to be readily seen at any time. The accompanying photograph (taken on July 8, 1892, from the same position as, but one day earlier than, the one of last year which faces page 13 of Vol. II of the Case) shows pups the mothers of which are already at sea. [Photograph faces p. 385].

The fact that the coat of the cow assumes, from residence on the shore, a rusty or sunburnt aspect, gives a ready means of observing her movements. The rustiness is quickly lost by life in the sea.

The movements of females can also to a certain extent be well observed by their appearance after giving birth to their pups, after fast

'The United States will lay before the Tribunal a series of photographs taken by Mr. Stanley-Brown during the seasons of 1891 and 1892, in illustration of seal life in general upon the Pribilof Islands.