34 



In different localities under different conditions were different forms of life. 

 We have noted this regarding plants. It was so concerning animals. 



American Bisons ( JSt'sou americanuH (Tmelin), generally known as Buffaloes, 

 ranged in countless numbers over the meadows and iirairies at the time we first 

 learn of them. The AVhitewater and .Miami valleys formed routes to the Ohio River 

 and the Big Bone Lick in Kentucky. The Wabash Valley became another avenue 

 for their journeys, and the old trail from tlie prairies to the Kentucky barrens 

 crossed the Wabash River below Vincennes. Over tliis wide, well-marked road, 

 evidences of which still remain, countless thousands oi Bisons passed annXially* 

 From the Ohio River to Big Bone Lick wa-; a wide road which these animals had 

 beaten "spacious enough for two waggons to go abreast."^ Evidence of their for- 

 mer abundance is preserved in tUe swamps about this lick. In places their bones 

 are massed to the depth of two feet or more, as close as the stones of a pavement, 

 and so beaten down by succeeding herds as to make it difficult to lift them from 

 their beds. ^ .\t the Blue Licks in Kentucky we are told in 1784: "The amazing 

 herds of buffaloes which resort thither, by their size and number, fill the traveler 

 with amazement and terror, especially when he beholds the prodigious roads they 

 have made from all quarters, as if leading to some populous city; the vast space 

 of hind around these springs desolated as if by a ravaging enemy, and hills re- 

 duced to plains, for the land near these springs is chiefly hilly. "-^ In the region 

 that was densely wooded the Bisons were onlv seen as transients, but in the 

 meadows and prairies they abounded. From the summit of the hill at Ouiatanon 

 we are told, in 171S: "Nothing is visible to the eye but prairies full of 

 bu Haloes. "■* 



Elk {Cerviix canadensis Erxleben ) were common, and Deer {Cariacus virgin^ 

 ianas Gray) still more so. Bear and wolves were (luite abundant. In one favor- 

 ite locality, it is reported, a good hunter, without much fatigue to himself, could 

 supply daily one hundred men with meat. Beaver ( Castor ^6ej' L. ) were found 

 in many localities. p]specially favorable to them were the more level regions to 

 the northward. Otter [Lutra canadensis Sabine) were quite common, while the 

 AVild Cat {Lynx rufus Raf. ), Canada Porcupine {Erethizon dorsahis V. Cuvier) 

 and Panther {Fefis concolor L. ) were numerous. 



1. Journal of Colonel Croghan: Butler's History of Kentucky, 1834, p. 368. 

 ■2. Dr. A. W. Brayton: Kept, of Geolofrical Survey of Ohio, Vol. ly, Pt. I, Mammals, 

 pp. 7o-77. 



3. W. T. llornaday: Kept. U. S. National Museum, 1887, pp. 387, 388. 



4. Paris Documents, 1718: Colonial Hist. N. Y., Vol. TX. p. 891. 



