One Of These Animals,
Which Was On A Sand-Bar As The Boat Passed, Raised Himself
On His Hind Feet, And After Looking At The Party For A Moment,
Plunged In And Swam Towards Them; But, After Receiving Three Balls
In The Body, He Turned And Made For The Shore.
Towards evening
they saw another enter the water to swim across; when Captain Clark
directed the boat towards the shore, and just as the animal landed
shot it in the head.
It proved to be the largest female they had
ever seen, and was so old that its tusks were worn quite smooth.
The boats escaped with difficulty between two herds of buffalo that
were crossing the river, and came near being again detained by them.
Among the elk of this neighborhood they saw an unusual number of males,
while higher up the herds consisted chiefly of females."
It is almost incredible that these wild animals should have been
so nearly exterminated by hunters and other rovers of the plains,
very soon after travel set in across the continent. The writer of
these lines, who crossed the plains to California so lately as 1856,
saw buffalo killed for the sake of their tongues, or to give rifle
practice to the wayfarers. After the overland railroad was opened,
passengers shot buffalo from the car-windows, well knowing that they could
not get their game, even if they should kill as they flew by a herd.
There are no buffalo nor elk where millions once roamed almost unmolested.
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