THE EUROPEAN BISON 77 



shaggy troops must have been a fine sight climbing 

 the rugged hillsides or bathing in the rivers. So 

 plentiful were they in 1594, that peasants passing 

 through the Transylvanian forests were sometimes 

 trampled to death by a rush of startled bonasus. 

 The old Polish kings and nobles had grand sport 

 with these magnificent animals, taking the woods 

 with thousands of beaters ; perhaps the last to enjoy 

 such royal pastime was Augustus III. of Poland, 

 who in 1752 killed no less than sixty bison. The 

 last bison shot in Pomerania was killed by Duke 

 Wratislaw V. about the middle of the fourteenth 

 century doubtless with a crossbow ; one of its 

 horns, originally used as a drinking cup, was after- 

 wards deposited as a reliquary in the Cathedral of 

 Commin. It is said that the last bison taken in 

 Hungary was killed in the forest of Sohl by an 

 expert crossbow shooter as early as the reign of 

 King Mathias (1458-1490) ; but according to Edward 

 von Crynk this did not occur till 1814, when the 

 last survivor was slain in the Siebenberg. The last 

 bison in Prussia was killed by two poachers in 1755. 

 Unsettled political conditions have rendered it 

 difficult to satisfactorily protect the Polish bison, 

 and many were killed in 1863 by insurgents who 

 took refuge in the forests. In the Caucasus, however, 

 the wild bonasus yet linger in small troops, sole 

 remnant of a once widespread race ; they frequent the 

 northern side of the mountains, and occur in the 



