EXPEDITION TO THE MISSOURI 255 



the fort, where he occupied the room which had been 

 used by Maximilian, Prince of Neuwied, when traveling 

 through the western parts of America ten years before; 

 here Audubon made many drawings. Buffalo were 

 abundant on all sides, and a favorite occupation was 

 shooting wolves from the ramparts of the fort. On 

 June 18 they killed two antelope and two deer before 

 noon, and "immediately after dinner," he said, "the 

 head of the old male was cut off, and I went to work 

 outlining it; first small, with the camera lucida, and 

 then by squares." On the 30th he wrote: "I began 

 drawing at five this morning, and worked almost with- 

 out cessation till after three, when becoming fatigued 

 for want of practice, I took a short walk, regretting that 

 I could no longer draw twelve or fourteen hours without 

 a pause, or thought of weariness." 



On the 15th of July they started up the shore of the 

 Yellowstone in a cart. The party soon had had enough 

 of buffalo hunting, and on one day the naturalist was 

 nearly speared by a charging bull that had been wound- 

 ed. 'What a terrible destruction of life," he says, "as 

 it were for nothing, or next to it, as the tongues only 

 were brought in, and the flesh of these fine animals was 

 left to beasts and birds of prey, or to rot on the spots 

 where they fell. The prairies are literally covered with 

 the skulls of the victims, and the roads the Buffalo 

 make in crossing the prairies have all the appearance of 

 heavy wagon tracks." Foreseeing the departure of the 

 buffalo, he wrote : 



One can hardly conceive how it happens, notwithstanding 

 these many deaths and the immense numbers that are mur- 

 dered almost daily on these boundless wastes called prairies, 

 besides the hosts that are drowned in the freshets, and the hun- 





