The Lordly Buffalo. 2 53 



the man in front. He leaped to one side just in time, one 

 of her horns grazing him, ripping away his clothes and 

 knocking him over ; as he lay she tried to jump on him 

 with her forefeet, but he rolled to one side, and as she 

 went past she kicked at him like a vicious mule. The 

 effort exhausted her, however, and she fell before going a 

 dozen yards farther. The man who was charged had 

 rather a close shave ; thanks to the rashness and contempt 

 of the game's prowess which they all felt for all three are 

 very quiet men and not afraid of any thing. It is always a 

 good rule to be cautious in dealing with an apparently 

 dead or dying buffalo. About the time the above inci- 

 dent occurred a party of hunters near my ranch killed a 

 buffalo, as they thought, and tied a pony to its foreleg, to 

 turn it over, as its position was a very bad one for skinning. 

 Barely had the pony been tied when the buffalo came to 

 with a jump, killed the unfortunate pony, and needed a 

 dozen more balls before he fell for good. 



At that time the buffalo would occasionally be scat- 

 tered among the cattle, but, as a rule, avoided the latter 

 and seemed to be afraid of them ; while the cattle, on the 

 contrary, had no apparent dread of the buffalo, unless it 

 happened that on some occasion they got caught by a 

 herd of the latter that had stampeded. A settler or small 

 ranchman, not far from my place, was driving in a team of 

 oxen in a wagon one day three years since, when, in cross- 

 ing a valley, he encountered a little herd of stampeded 

 buffalo, who, in their blind and heedless terror, ran into 

 him and knocked over the wagon and oxen. The oxen 

 never got over the fright the rough handling caused them, 



