The American Wilderness. 13 



Moreover, the regular army which played so important 

 a part in all the later stages of the winning of the west 

 produced its full share of mighty hunters. The later In^ 

 dian wars were fought principally by the regulars. The 

 West Point officer and his little company of trained sol- 

 diers appeared abreast of the first hardy cattlemen and 

 miners. The ordinary settlers rarely made their appear- 

 ance until in campaign after campaign, always inconceiv- 

 ably wearing and harassing, and often very bloody in 

 character, the scarred and tattered troops had broken and 

 overthrown the most formidable among the Indian tribes. 

 Faithful, uncomplaining, unflinching, the soldiers wearing 

 the national uniform lived for many weary years at their 

 lonely little posts, facing unending toil and danger with 

 quiet endurance, surrounded by the desolation of vast sol- 

 itudes, and menaced by the most merciless of foes. Hunt- 

 ing was followed not only as a sport, but also as the only 

 means of keeping the posts and the expeditionary trains 

 in meat. Many of the officers became equally proficient 

 as marksmen and hunters. The three most famous In- 

 dian fighters since the Civil War, Generals Custer, Miles, 

 and Crook, were all keen and successful followers of the 

 chase. 



Of American big game the bison, almost always known 

 as the buffalo, was the largest and most important to man. 

 When the first white settlers landed in Virginia the bison 

 ranged east of the Alleghanies almost to the sea-coast, 

 westward to the dry deserts lying beyond the Rocky 

 Mountains, northward to the Great Slave Lake and south- 

 ward to Chihuahua. It was a beast of the forests and 



