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this habit offers an opportunity? Man is enabled by means of it to practice a species of husbandry. He can take the annual increase of that animal without in any respect diminishing its stock. In other words, he can deal with the animal precisely as he does with domestic animals and precisely as if the animal were domestic. Therefore we find here all the elements, all the foundations, upon which, as Blackstone calls it, property per industriam stands. You may ask what care, what industry man practices in reference to the seal. In the first place the United States, or Russia before the United States, carried thither to these islands several hundred people, and instituted a guard over those islands and preserved the seals and protected them against all other dangers except that of being slaughtered in the manner which I have described-a very great labor and a great deal of expense. The seals are freely invited to come to those islands. No obstacle is thrown in their way. Their annual return is cherished in every way in which it can be cherished. Very great expense is undergone in extending this sort of protection over them. In the next place, and what is particularly important, the United States, and Russia before the United States, practiced a self-denial, an abstinence, in reference to that animal. They did not club him the moment he landed and apply him to their purposes indiscriminately, male and female. They did not take one in this way. They carefully avoided it. They practiced a self-denial. And that self-denial, and the care and industry in other respects which I have mentioned, lead those seals to come to those islands year after year, where they thus submit themselves to human power so as to enable the whole benefit of the animal to be applied to the uses of man. Let me ask what would have been the case if this care and industry had not been applied? Suppose the art and industry of the United States and its self-denial had not been exerted, what would have been the result? We have only to look to the fate of the seal in other quarters of the globe where no such care was exerted, to learn what would have been the result. They would have been exterminated a hundred years ago.

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"Therefore, I respectfully submit to you that the present existence of that herd on those islands-the life of every one of those seals, be they a thousand, or be they five millions-is the direct product of the care, industry, labor, and expense of the United States; and they would not be there except for that care and industry."

Limitations on the Do

The idea that the title to property is not absolute, but is coupled with a trust for the minion over Things. benefit of mankind-an idea expressed in his written argument-was elaborated by Mr. Carter in his oral argument. As illustrations of his meaning, he gave several examples showing, as he maintained, the obligatory character

of the trust for mankind and the duty to work it out through the instrumentality of commerce. These illustrations were as follows:

"Let me suppose an article like india rubber, which has become a supreme necessity to the human race all over the world. It is produced in very few places. It is possible that the nation which has dominion over those places might seek to exclude it from the commerce of the world. It might go so far as to attempt to destroy the plantations which produce the tree from which the gum is extracted. Would such an attempt give any right to any other nation? Most certainly it would! It would give a right to other nations to interfere and take possession, if necessary, of the regions in which that article so important, so necessary to mankind, was alone grown, in order that they might supply themselves,

"The PRESIDENT. Do you mean a legal right?

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"Mr. CARTER. I mean a perfect legal right in international law. In international law we have a whole chapter in regard to the instances in which one nation may justly interfere in the affairs of another. Take one instance,

which is generally spoken of as the means adopted to preserve the balance of power.' When one nation in Europe seeks to so extend itself as to threaten what has been styled the balance of power, this has from an early period in European history been deemed a cause of interference by other nations, and, if necessary, of war.

"The PRESIDENT. It is one of the forms of self-defense.

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"Mr. CARTER. The coffee of Central America and Arabia is not the exclusive property of those two nations; the tea of China, the rubber of South America, are not the exclusive property of those nations where it is grown; they are, so far as not needed by the nations which enjoy the possession, the common property of mankind; and if the nations which have the custody of them withdraw them, they are failing in their trust, and other nations have a right to interfere and secure their share.

"Lord HANNEN. May they sell them at their own price, although it may be a very high price?

"Mr. CARTER. Yes, until they come to put a price upon them which amounts to a refusal to sell them-when they arrogate to themselves the exclusive benefits of blessings which were intended for all, then you can interfere. Upon what other ground can we defend the seizures by the European powers of the territories of the New World-the great continents of North and South America? * They never asked permission; they took them forcibly and against the will of the natives. That policy has been pursued by civilized nations for centuries. Is it robbery, or is it defensible? I assert that it is not robbery, because those barbarous and uncivilized peoples did not apply the bounties they

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possessed to the purposes for which nature and nature's God intended them; they were not faithful to the trust which was imposed upon them; they were incapable of discharging to mankind the duties which the possessors of such blessings ought to discharge. What did England do in the case of China in 1840, for instance? She made war upon China and subdued her. Why? The real cause of war is not always correctly stated in the pretext given for it, and in that instance the pretext was, I believe, some discourtesy which had been shown to individuals, some maltreatment of British officials. But if we look into the history of the matter, we find that the dispute began when China closed her ports, and that it terminated with the treaty by which she bound herself to keep them open. This war was defensible; I do not put it as an offense on the part of Great Britain.

"Take the case of Peruvian bark. This product is commonly regarded as absolutely necessary in the economy of society; it is a necessity for the cure of certain diseases; it is a specific for them; they will rage unrestrained unless you have Peruvian bark. Now, suppose the countries where it is grown should say that for some reason or other they will not carry on commerce; and not only that, but that they propose to devastate the plantations where the bark is cultivated—is mankind going to permit that? Why is Great Brit

ain in Egypt maintaining a control over the destiny of that nation? What reason has she for asserting a dominion over these poor Egyptians? Is it because they are weak and defenseless? Is that the only reason? No; I suppose that those who have the destinies of Great Britain in their charge can make out a better case than that. Egypt is the pathway of a mighty commerce; it is necessary that that commerce should be free and unrestrained--that great avenue and highway of traffic must be made to yield the utmost benefit of which it is capable. If the government of Egypt is not capable of making it yield its utmost-if that government is incapable of doing so, other nations have a right to interfere and see that the trust is performed.

"The PRESIDENT. I am afraid that you take a very high point of view, Mr. Carter, because you seem to anticipate the judgments of history. I can not say more at present.

"Mr. CARTER. Not a higher view than is sustained by the practice of mankind for three hundred years."

Seals and Certain
Wild Animals.

Mr. Carter drew a distinction between herds Difference Between of fur seals and polygamous domestic animals, such as horses, cattle, or fowls, on the ground that the latter can be produced almost anywhere and are capable of indefinite increase, while in the case of the seals the places where they could be produced are so few and the demand so far exceeds the supply that the great

object is "not only to preserve the present normal number, but to increase it." To do this there was, he declared, "no way except by saving all the females." Having drawn this distinction, he then proceeded to speak of "the difference between the seals and wild animals, such as birds of the air, wild ducks, fishes of the sea, mackerel, herring, and all those fishes which constitute food for man and upon which he makes prodigious attacks." In respect of such animals man can not, he said, confine himself to the annual increase; he can not separate it from the stock nor tell male from female. Hence he "can not practice any kind of husbandry" in respect of such animals. Continuing, Mr. Carter said:

"And here it will be observed how nature seems to take notice of the impotence of man and furnishes means of perpetuating the species of the wild animals last mentioned. Take the herring, the mackerel, the cod; they do not produce one only at a birth, but a million! They produce enough not only to supply all the wants of man, but the wants of other races of fishes that feed upon them. There

is another mode designed by nature for their preservation, and that is the facility which she gives them to escape capture. Man lays hold of some of them which come within his range, but the great body of them never come there. With the seals it is otherwise. They have no defense. They are obliged to spend five months of the year on the land where man can slaughter them; and even at sea they can not escape him, as the evidence clearly proves.

"Marquis VISCONTI-VENOSTA. Do you know any other animals besides the seal that are situate in like conditions?

“Mr. CARTER. None under precisely the same conditions. I hear my learned friend whisper 'sea otter,' but you can not practice any sort of husbandry with the sea otter. It never places itself like the seal under the power of man.

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"The PRESIDENT. You will not put the sea otter on the same legal footing as you do the fur seal?

As

"Mr. CARTER. No. So far as I am aware, man has no sure means of preserving the sea otter, for it seems to me that he has exterminated it almost altogether. Then take the case of the canvas-back duck, a bird which abounded in America. long as man made but a slight attack upon its numbers-fifty years ago, when there were no railroads and when the means of transporting it were quite imperfect-this bird was found in great plenty, but the abundance was confined to the locality where it was found. But now it can be transported five thou sand miles without injury, and the whole world makes an attack upon it. The law may protect it a little, but it can not protect it altogether from the cupidity of man; and this creature, too, is fast disappearing.

"In other words, these birds have all the characteristics of wild animals, and none of the characteristics of tame animals. You can not practice any husbandry in regard to them. No man and no nation can say to the rest of the world that he has a mode of dealing with them which will enable him to take the annual increase without destroying the stock.

When a more accurate knowledge is had of the habits of fishes it may come to be ascertained that the inhabitants of some shores can protect some races of fishes which resort to that shore, provided other persons are required to keep their hands off.

"The PRESIDENT. And that would give a right of appropriation, in your view?

"Mr. CARTER. Yes; that would tend that way. If they could furnish the protection and no one else could. That would be the tendency of my argument. I am glad to see that the learned president catches it.

"The consequence of the proved facts is that the fur seal can not maintain itself against unrestricted human attack.”

After Mr. Carter had made the distinction The Duty of Protec- between seals and certain wild animals not the

of the United States.

tion and the Laws subject property, on the ground of the impossi bility of exercising a husbandry in respect of the latter, a question arose as to the extent of the right and duty of protection claimed for the United States in respect of the fur seals. In this relation the following dialogue occurred:

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"The PRESIDENT. Mr. Carter, may I ask you a question? "Mr. CARTER. Certainly. "The PRESIDENT. * * My question is, Does the Amer. ican Company contend, as I understand you to contend, that the owners, whoever they be, of the Pribilof herd, have a right of property or protection in these animals, wherever they be; and if they have the right of property and protection, have they a legal right as well as moral right to complain of the United States not punishing pelagic sealing anywhere else, wherever the seals may go; for if I understand your purport they have a right of property or protection anywhere-not only in Alaskan waters.

"Mr. CARTER. I agree to your suggestion that the lessees of these islands would have a moral right.

"The PRESIDENT. No; I ask you whether they have a legal right?

"Mr. CARTER. Not quite a legal right, perhaps, because at the time when their lease was executed and their rights were acquired it might be said to be the fair interpretation of that document that they took their right to the fur seals subject to the existing condition of things and that if there was any failure on the part of the United States to repress pelagic sealing they took it subject to that failure.