there. The sealing industry soon became exceedingly lucra tive, and vessels from the maritime provinces of the Dominion of Canada were attracted to it. Their crews, not being bound by the restraints imposed by the law of the United States upon American citizens, killed the seals wherever they could find them outside the ordinary limits of territorial waters. The American sealers complained and protested; and in 1886 three schooners belonging to Victoria, British Columbia, were seized while fishing about seventy miles from land, and taken before the District Court of Sitka for trial on a charge of infringing the law which forbade the killing of fur-seals within the limits of Alaska and its waters, except under authorization from the Secretary of the United States Treasury. The judge who tried the case laid down in his charge to the jury that the territorial waters of Alaska included the whole of the vast area 1500 miles in width and 700 miles in depth - bounded by the limits mentioned in the treaty of cession of 1867 as those "within which the territories and dominions conveyed are contained.” 1 Thus directed, the jury found the prisoners guilty, and the penalties of imprisonment for themselves and confiscation for their vessels and cargoes were enforced against them. Great Britain at once remonstrated. The seizure of other vessels elevated the difficulty to the rank of a great international controversy, which was carried on for several years and threatened more than once to disturb the peaceful relations between the two countries. Happily, however, it was referred to the arbitration of a board of seven jurists, two being appointed by each of the parties to the controversy, one by the President of the French Republic, one by the King of Italy, and one by the King of Sweden and Norway.2 The award of this tribunal was given at Paris, on August the 15th,

1 Treaties of the United States, p. 940; British State Papers, Correspondence respecting the Behring Sea Seal-fisheries, 1886-1890, p. 2.

2 Message of President Harrison transmitting Treaty of Arbitration of February 9, 1892, to the Senate, March 8, 1892.

1893.

The arbitrators found for Great Britain on all the points of International Law in dispute. They agreed that by the treaty of 1867 Russia ceded to the United States all her rights within the boundaries therein defined; but they held that the jurisdiction over enormous tracts of open ocean claimed by Alexander I. in 1821 was not among those rights. International Law never gave it to Russia, and she could not cede what she did not possess. Accordingly, the territorial rights of the United States in the waters of Alaska were limited to its bays and gulfs and the marine league along its shores. They had no property in the fur-seals when found outside these limits, and no power to protect them from seizure on the high seas by the citizens of other countries. At the same time, the tribunal recognized the force of the American contention, that it was necessary to put the fishery under regulations in order to preserve the seal-herd from grievous diminution, if not utter destruction. The treaty of reference gave the arbitrators power to devise such regulations, in case they declared Bering Sea open to the fishingvessels of all nations. They exercised this power, and drew up an elaborate code, which established a close time for seals, forbade their capture within sixty miles of the Pribyloff Islands, decreed that only sailing vessels should engage in the fishery, and laid down many other rules which the two powers brought into effect by means of domestic legislation in 1894.

It can hardly be doubted that the decision of the arbitrators was good in International Law. The claim to exercise rights of sovereignty over Bering Sea was contrary to principles which had been asserted by no power more vigorously than the United States; 2 and it was extremely difficult to reconcile the action of its Government towards the British sealers with

1 Award of Arbitrators in the London "Times" of August 16, 1893, and other London and New York newspapers.

2 Wheaton, International Law (Dana's ed.), p. 260, note 108; Wharton, International Law of the United States, I., 105.

there. The sealing industry soon became exceedingly lucra tive, and vessels from the maritime provinces of the Dominion of Canada were attracted to it. Their crews, not being bound by the restraints imposed by the law of the United States upon American citizens, killed the seals wherever they could find them outside the ordinary limits of territorial waters. The American sealers complained and protested; and in 1886 three schooners belonging to Victoria, British Columbia, were seized while fishing about seventy miles from land, and taken before the District Court of Sitka for trial on a charge of infringing the law which forbade the killing of fur-seals within the limits of Alaska and its waters, except under authorization from the Secretary of the United States Treasury. The judge who tried the case laid down in his charge to the jury that the territorial waters of Alaska included the whole of the vast area-1500 miles in width and 700 miles in depth-bounded by the limits mentioned in the treaty of cession of 1867 as those "within which the territories and dominions conveyed are contained." 1 Thus directed, the jury found the prisoners guilty, and the penalties of imprisonment for themselves and confiscation for their vessels and cargoes were enforced against them. Great Britain at once remonstrated. The seizure of other vessels elevated the difficulty to the rank of a great international controversy, which was carried on for several years and threatened more than once to disturb the peaceful relations between the two countries. Happily, however, it was referred to the arbitration of a board of seven jurists, two being appointed by each of the parties to the controversy, one by the President of the French Republic, one by the King of Italy, and one by the King of Sweden and Norway.2 The award of this tribunal was given at Paris, on August the 15th,

1 Treaties of the United States, p. 940; British State Papers, Correspondence respecting the Behring Sea Seal-fisheries, 1886-1890, p. 2.

2 Message of President Harrison transmitting Treaty of Arbitration of February 9, 1892, to the Senate, March 8, 1892.

v far some of these ver in recent times vereignty over the Pellor Kent declared f her claim to "suthe British Isles," ns made early in the on, including as they ival warfare between e, or at least within and along the open well be questioned ade to enforce these The United States has ment of such claims, Fish, when Secretary n, then British MinisTe have always underblic law, no nation can marine league from its world sets strongly in e few cases in which ys are still allowed as

Abdy's ed.), 113, 114. ited States, I., 105.

the attitude assumed by Mr. Adams in the controversy with Russia provoked by the ukase of 1821.1 The contention that the seals are semi-domestic animals, and as such the property of the United States, will hardly bear investigation. They are wild creatures whom each may catch on his own territory or in localities belonging to no one. The United States can claim no rights over them after they have left its waters; for they are then as much beyond its authority as are the big game of the northwest plains when they have wandered across the border into Canadian territory. The assertion that the destruction of the seals at sea is immoral, was an exaggerated statement of the principle that to destroy a useful animal is detrimental to the welfare of the human race. The experts differed widely as to the effect of the sea-fishing upon the numbers of the seals; but even had the evidence in favor of its disastrous consequences been stronger than it was, the United States would not have been justified by it in assuming a right to make their ideas of proper regulation the law of the civilized world. They could legislate for their own citizens in their own vessels on the high seas, not for the citizens of other states lawfully navigating the ships of those states. But undoubtedly they had a strong moral claim on foreign nations for a mutual agreement, which should put an end to all danger of the extermination of the seals. As a result of the arbitration they have obtained such an agreement beween themselves and Great Britain; and, if it works well,3 we may hope that it will be brought, as the treaty directs, to the notice of other maritime powers whose subjects are likely to engage in the fishery, and receive general assent. The creation of what has been well called "an International Game Law" is the true solution of the difficulty. This, and the

1 Wheaton, Int. Law, § 168; Wharton, Int. Law of U. S., II., 270, 271. 2 British State Papers, Correspondence respecting the Behring Sec Fisheries, 1886-1890, pp. 398, 462; Hon. E. J. Phelps, article in Harper's Magazine for April, 1891.

3 Unfortunately it has not worked well. The two countries were soon in hot dispute as to the alleged extermination of the seals by pelagic sealing, and in 1897 they agreed to a conference of experts to investigate the matter further. The report of these commissioners, issued early in 1898, declared that there was no cause to fear the extermination of the species.