HISTORY. 211 



From the habits of this creature, his indoeility, and the in- 

 stinctive aversion to the domestic races, it will appear that he 

 is not one of those animals which Providence has ordained to 

 yield up their services to man, and become an instrument of 

 good to our race. He is rather to be numbered amongst 

 those which are destined to disappear before the progress of 

 civilization and the arts. By a rare chance, human interfer- 

 ence has saved the wreck of the species in Europe from that 

 destruction which awaited it ; but this can only be for a 

 season, and the time will doubtless come, when the great 

 Bison of the European woods will be numbered with those 

 extinct species, whose bones alone remain to testify their 

 former existence. 



The next to be mentioned of the Bisontine group is proper 

 to another hemisphere, and was only made known to us when 

 the rich savannahs and boundless forests of the Western Con- 

 tinent revealed their living inhabitants to the wondering eyes 

 of European travellers. The AMERICAN BISON, Bison Ame- 

 ricanus, commonly, but erroneously, termed a Buffalo, re- 

 sembles the Bison of Europe in his general form, and in some 

 of his habits. His head is large ; his forehead is broad 

 and convex; his horns are short, thick, and black; his 

 eyes are small, clear, and piercing, with a placid expres- 

 sion, except when he is irritated, and then the expression 

 turns to that of ferocity and rage. He is very bulky in 

 front, and has large withers, to which powerful muscles 

 are attached to support his ponderous head. The back 

 droops from the withers, and the posterior part of the body 

 is meagre and thin. On the summit of his head there is 

 an abundance of long woolly hair, which hangs over the 

 face, the ears, and the horns. The throat, the neck, the 

 shoulders, and the breast, are covered with long hair ; the 

 back, and the rest of the trunk, are covered with short hairy 

 wool. The colour of his fur is, in summer, a light brown, in 

 winter a brownish-black. The tail is about eighteen inches 



