306 The Antelope. 



skin and hair. From this odor the antelope was formerly called 

 " goat," cabree, and cabrit ; but these names are obsolete. Prong'- 

 horn is its book name. 



The antelope was formerly found all over the plains and among 

 the mountains of the west, wherever the country was adapted to it, 

 from latitude 53 N. south into Mexico, and from about the meridian 

 of 95 west longitude to the Pacific Ocean. There is no evidence 

 to show that it ever ranged east of the Mississippi River. All 

 through the great region indicated it was once abundant, and 

 was equally at home on the flat prairies of the Platte River 

 bottom, the broken bad lands of Dakota and Montana, or among the 

 rugged foot-hills, sage-brush plateaus, and bald mountain slopes of 

 the main range. It is essentially a dweller in the open country and 

 is never found far back in the forests. What it requires, above all 

 things, is a place from which it can overlook all its surroundings ; 

 for, although the antelope's powers of scent are very keen, it depends 

 chiefly upon its eyes for warning of impending danger. Still, it is 

 not true, as has been asserted by most writers on this species, that 

 it has a great terror of forests and is never found among them. In 

 the Rocky Mountains, I have frequently seen antelope feeding among 

 the timber in open pine forests, as well as where there was under- 

 growth, and in North Park, Colorado, where a few years ago this 

 species was to be found in great abundance, I have seen them by 

 hundreds feeding in the bottom of Michigan Creek among thick 

 willows, which were there from twenty to thirty feet high. In such 

 situations they may be easily approached. It has been my experi- 

 ence, however, that if they are once alarmed, it is impossible to drive 

 antelope into the timber. During the summer they are fond of 

 feeding high up in the mountains in the little grassy, park-like valleys 

 which open into one another and become constantly smaller toward 

 the higher ground, being thus often nearly or quite surrounded by 

 thick forest. I have sometimes, on entering such a little park by the 

 only opening into it, come upon a band of antelope, and seen them 

 rush across the open, and then, as they approached the timber, turn 

 and run around the whole circumference of the meadow, and at length, 

 as if in desperation, turn again and run toward and by me, and out 

 of the little opening, so close that I could have thrown a rope over 

 any one of the band. 



