WOLVES AND WOLFHOUNDS. 181 



Formerly wolves were incredibly abundant 

 in certain parts of the country, notably on the 

 great plains, where they were known as buffalo 

 wolves, and were regular attendants on the 

 great herds of the bison. Every traveller and 

 hunter of the old days knew them as among 

 the most common sights of the plains, and 

 they followed the hunting parties and emigrant 

 trains for the sake of the scraps left in camp. 

 Now, however, there is no district in which they 

 are really abundant. The wolfers, or profes- 

 sional wolf-hunters, who killed them by poison- 

 ing for the sake of their fur, and the cattle- 

 men, who likewise killed them by poisoning 

 because of their raids on the herds, have doubt- 

 less been the chief instruments in working their 

 decimation on the plains. In the '70*3, and 

 even in the early '8o's, many tens of thousands 

 of wolves were killed by the wolfers inMontana 

 and northern Wyoming and western Dakota. 

 Nowadays the surviving wolves of the plains 

 have learned caution ; they no longer move 

 abroad at midday, and still less do they dream 

 of hanging on the footsteps of hunter and 

 traveller. Instead of being one of the most 

 common they have become one of the rarest 

 sights of the plains. A hunter may wander far 

 and wide through the plains for months now- 

 adays and never see a wolf, though he will 

 probably see many coyotes. However, the 

 diminution goes on, not steadily but by fits and 

 starts, and, moreover, the beasts now and then 

 change their abodes, and appear in numbers 

 in places where they have been scarce for a 



