The Bison 115 



were last seen in the valley of the Platte. The 

 herd had been split. 



As other railroads to the southward pushed 

 into the buffalo country, the same scenes were 

 enacted. The buffalo country swarmed with 

 hunters who came in constantly increasing num- 

 bers, so that none of them earned any money 

 by their butcher's work. The price of hides fell, 

 but the buffalo continued to be slaughtered. Hun- 

 dreds of thousands of hides went to market, but 

 these were only a small proportion of the buffalo 

 killed. Colonel Dodge has expressed the belief, 

 that of the buffalo killed, only one-fourth or one- 

 fifth reached a market. It is conceivable that 

 the proportion was even less. A very large num- 

 ber of the hunters knew nothing about hunting, 

 or shooting, or skinning a buffalo, or curing its 

 hide. The number of maimed and crippled ani- 

 mals that went off to die was very large. The 

 number of hides ruined in skinning was large, 

 and the number improperly cured was still larger. 



By the latter part of 1874, buffalo to the south- 

 ward of the Platte River began to be very scarce, 

 and in 1876 they were almost gone. After that 

 none were found in the southern country except 

 a few in the southern portion of the Indian 



