THE GRASS-FED HORSE AND THE BISON. 297 



where the animals take the water. The grass at the 

 " slide" seemed to be laid all one way, as if the beavers 

 came with a rush to their favourite element. Along the 

 side of the stream were trees, some of them as thick as 

 my waist, all more or less ready to fall, these curious 

 animals working at them on the contrary side from 

 the direction they wished the tree to take, and not the 

 mark of a tooth in the wrong place. The dam to pen 

 back the water, and which made a waterfall, was from 

 four to five feet high, and as complete and beautifully 

 erected with weeds, twigs, mud, and grass as anything 

 could by possibility be. Had wfe had time we might 

 have dug down to and stormed the holt of these beavers, 

 and had some capital sport with Druid and Bar ; but as 

 the leave of my companions was up, and they were 

 forced to return to Fort Biley, with a sigh I bade adieu 

 to the amphibious game, and we proceeded to our dinner 

 at the camp. 



On thinking over my chase of the splendid bull, as 

 narrated in the last chapter, in all his full power of life 

 and limb, and bringing him to an unwounded bay, I 

 made up my mind, that supposing the hunter could 

 afford to take so much out of his horse, it was infinitely 

 the most graceful as well as enjoyable way of killing the 

 great bison. It had been told me in St Louis, and other 

 places, that a corn-reared horse, when on prairie grass, and 

 nothing eke, could not run down a buffalo, and that a 

 horse so fed could not very long hold his own, even at the 

 side of the retreating herd ; that no one had ever so 

 rode down an unwounded bison on a horse so situated, 

 and that an attempt to do it would be vain, for that a 

 buffalo, sound and unwounded, could continue his gallop 

 for many hours. I am now convinced, however, that 



