200 THE AMERICAN BISON 



which, physically, they may be quite incapable of 

 acting, but which causes them to be feared, or at least 

 avoided, by other, possibly unfriendly, animals. In the 

 vegetable kingdom, perhaps the most familiar example 

 of this deliberate mimicry is furnished by the dead 

 nettle (Lamium), which, springing in the hedgerow 

 side by side with the stinging nettle ( Urtica), a plant of 

 widely different affinity, resembles it so closely as to be 

 practically indistinguishable to the casual eye until the 

 flowers appear upon each. Among birds, the domestic 

 gander is scarcely capable of injuring a schoolgirl ; but 

 many a grown person has quickened his pace across 

 the common to avoid the threatened assault of the 

 bird, which comes at him with lowered head, open beak, 

 and angry hiss. Again, among reptiles, how few people 

 have the nerve to lay hand upon a slow worm, which 

 is not a snake, though closely resembling one, but a 

 legless, wholly innocuous lizard. And so, coming to 

 the higher organisms, of all the mammalian inhabitants 

 of our planet none exceeds the American bison (com- 

 monly spoken of as buffalo) in ferocity of mien. The 

 normal expression on the countenance of a bison bull 

 is one of slumberous wrath and watchful malevolence ; 

 the small, quick eyes, scintillating under vast, shaggy 

 brows, betoken sudden violence of assault, which lithe 

 activity of limb and loin will make irresistible. 



This is all sheer bluff. The appearance of the crea- 

 ture completely belies its character and intentions. Its 

 speed is employed to keep out of the way of man, 

 whose presence, except when attacked or wounded, it 

 scrupulously avoids; and in captivity bisons are 



