INTRODUCTORY 



THE KING OF THE PLAINS 



AT the opening of the last century, and 

 even as late as 1871, when the Union 

 Pacific Railroad cleft the great herds 

 asunder, there roamed upon the vast 

 American plains, stretching from the Alle- 

 ghany Mountains to the Rockies, and from 

 the Mexican border to the Hudson Bay 

 country, probably the most inconceivable 

 herd of wild animals ever ranging upon a 

 single continent. This almost countless 

 herd was formed of hundreds of millions of 

 American bison, or buffalo, as they were 

 indiscriminately called. 



The bison ranged even farther from the 

 great plains than has been indicated, for in 

 Colonial times they were found in small 

 numbers in Western New York and Penn- 



