The Thundering Herd 85 



accountable reason, the great herd had 

 come down for a part of the way on the 

 Missouri River on its southern migration 

 following the old trail of two decades 

 before, instead of crossing Western Ne- 

 braska and Kansas. It had been a costly 

 experiment, however, for all the way hunt- 

 ers had swarmed upon their flanks and 

 they had lost thousands of head, but their 

 number was legion, so what did it matter? 1 



1 At the time of which I am writing the bison had disap- 

 peared in all parts of Missouri, with the exception of the Bad 

 Lands, where they were still found in small bands. So persist- 

 ently did they stick to this wild country that Colonel Roosevelt 

 tells of shooting individual buffalo in Missouri as late as 1885. 



