Perhaps I Was Too Hasty, For The Gleaming Rifle-Barrel
Leveled Over The Edge Caught Their Notice; They Turned And Ran.
Close as they were, it was impossible to kill them when in that
position, and stepping upon the summit I pursued them over the high
arid tableland.
It was extremely rugged and broken; a great sandy
ravine was channeled through it, with smaller ravines entering on
each side like tributary streams. The buffalo scattered, and I soon
lost sight of most of them as they scuttled away through the sandy
chasms; a bull and a cow alone kept in view. For a while they ran
along the edge of the great ravine, appearing and disappearing as
they dived into some chasm and again emerged from it. At last they
stretched out upon the broad prairie, a plain nearly flat and almost
devoid of verdure, for every short grass-blade was dried and
shriveled by the glaring sun. Now and then the old bull would face
toward me; whenever he did so I fell to the ground and lay
motionless. In this manner I chased them for about two miles, until
at length I heard in front a deep hoarse bellowing. A moment after a
band of about a hundred bulls, before hidden by a slight swell of the
plain, came at once into view. The fugitives ran toward them.
Instead of mingling with the band, as I expected, they passed
directly through, and continued their flight. At this I gave up the
chase, and kneeling down, crawled to within gunshot of the bulls, and
with panting breath and trickling brow sat down on the ground to
watch them; my presence did not disturb them in the least. They were
not feeding, for, indeed, there was nothing to eat; but they seemed
to have chosen the parched and scorching desert as the scene of their
amusements. Some were rolling on the ground amid a cloud of dust;
others, with a hoarse rumbling bellow, were butting their large heads
together, while many stood motionless, as if quite inanimate. Except
their monstrous growth of tangled grizzly mane, they had no hair; for
their old coat had fallen off in the spring, and their new one had
not as yet appeared. Sometimes an old bull would step forward, and
gaze at me with a grim and stupid countenance; then he would turn and
butt his next neighbor; then he would lie down and roll over in the
dirt, kicking his hoofs in the air. When satisfied with this
amusement he would jerk his head and shoulders upward, and resting on
his forelegs stare at me in this position, half blinded by his mane,
and his face covered with dirt; then up he would spring upon all-
fours, and shake his dusty sides; turning half round, he would stand
with his beard touching the ground, in an attitude of profound
abstraction, as if reflecting on his puerile conduct. "You are too
ugly to live," thought I; and aiming at the ugliest, I shot three of
them in succession.
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