4 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE BUFFALO AND HIS FATE. 



By EENEST INGERSOLL. 



PERHAPS no indigenous animal of this country has attracted more 

 attention or met with a greater number of biographers than 

 the bison or buffalo. Its history has been a tale of extermination, 

 and a very few years are likely to see the last of these noble beasts 

 roaming over the Plains. For hundreds of years the few that remain 

 of the herds of aurochs, the European bison, have been kept in the 

 parks of the nobility ; but, in this " free " country, not even this means 

 of safety seems left to our persecuted buffalo. 



To the Spanish colonists the American bison was commonly known 

 under the name of cibola, while the French usually called it le been/, 

 buffle, vache sauvage, or bison d'Amerique. Peter Kalm, who trav- 

 eled through America in 1749, spoke of them as wilde ochsen and 

 Jcuhe. But the word buffalo at first spelled buffelo soon replaced 

 the earlier names. Scientific men claim that our species (Bison Ameri- 

 canus, Smith) should be called bison, as buffalo is applicable only to the 

 East Indian genus Bubalus. 



It appears that our bison has already outlived at least two other 

 races, which exceeded it in size the Bison latifrons and the Bison 

 antiquus. The former was contemporary with the mastodon, and was 

 an ox of gigantic bulk, the tips of whose horns were eleven or twelve 

 feet apart, and which probably stood as high as an elephant. Of the 

 latter species more abundant remains have been dug up, particularly 

 from the ice-cliffs at Escholtz Bay, on the Arctic coast north of 

 Alaska. This fossil ox was of smaller size than the Bison latifrons, 

 but much larger than the existing buffalo, although not greatly differ- 

 ent from it in form. It seems to have been spread over the northwest- 

 ern half of the continent from the Ohio Valley to Alaska, and every- 

 where its remains occur with those of the larger extinct mammalia, 

 yet it may have survived to a comparatively recent date. 



With the appearance of the buffalo, which only a few decades ago 

 swarmed in prodigious herds over nearly a third of North America, all 

 are familiar. The male measures about nine feet from the muzzle to 

 the insertion of the tail ; the female about six and a half feet. The 

 height to the top of the hump of the male is five and a half to six feet, 

 and of the female about five feet, sloping in each case to a height at the 

 hips of four and a half to four feet. The weight of the old males is 

 nearly two thousand pounds, while the cows weigh one thousand to 

 twelve hundred pounds. The horns are short, thick at the base, curved, 

 and sharply pointed; the hoofs are short and broad; the short tail ends 

 in a tuft of long hairs. In winter the head and whole under parts are 

 blackish-brown ; the upper surface lighter, fading as spring advances. 



