24 YEARBOOK, PUBLIC MUSEUM, MILWAUKEE. [Vol. I. 



Here the bank rises in a sheer bluff aliout one hundred and fifty feet 

 high and it was at this point that the Indians drove" the buifalo over the 

 brink, breaking legs, necks and liacks in the fall. Such a spot netted the 

 camp at a single drive tons of meat which was dried and made into 

 pemmican for winter use. The face of this cliff with the rolling prairie 

 over which the drive was made is shown in figure 1 1 . 



Though there has not been a drive at this spot for over a hundred 

 years, there still remained the vestiges of the rock piles, Ijehind which 

 the hunters hid as the herd approached. Originally these rock piles were 

 each about two feet high, just large enough to conceal a squatting man. 

 They were arranged in a V shape. The lines were a half mile or more 

 long, about a quarter of a mile apart at their outer or larger end and 

 converged until, at the l)rink of the precipice, they were not over fifty 

 feet apart. These dimensions were up to twice as great at certain other 

 drive sites, but the proportions are similar in all. 



One or two men carefully drove or enticed the desired portion of a 

 herd within the outer end of the V-shaped drive. Too many were likely 

 to prove unmanageable, besides the Indians profess to have had a desire 

 to conserve the supply. When the buffalo were well within the lines, 

 those hiding behind the stone and brush shelters, showed themselves 

 slightly and thus mildly alarmed the herd, gradually working it toward 

 the precipice. The farther the ])uffalo went down Ijetween the converg- 

 ing lines, the more confused and frightened they became, for the nearer 

 they approached the brink, the closer together stood the rock i)iles. each 

 with its shouting hunter waving his robe and otherwise frightening the 

 animals. As the herd passed each man, he followed, closing in and cut- 

 ting off retreat if an\- of the animals attempted to turn liack, which 

 rarely happened. 



To add to the stampede, there were two piles of stones some distance 

 out within the lines and directly in the path of the oncoming herd. These 

 two stations were occupied by two of the bravest and most fearless 

 hunters, whose duty it was to put the final touch on the confusion of the 

 herd by waiting till the leaders ai)proached the very brink of the precipice 

 and tlien springing suddenly u)i and especially frighten these foremost 

 animals which, l)eing thus completely hemmed in on all three sides, nat- 



=Before the advent of the horse, the Blackfoot also staU-ced the buffalo. 

 One method was as follows. Selecting if possible, a herd lying' at rest on the 

 prairie, two men tc)ok a Ijuffalo rolje, held it up, hair side outward, before 

 them and slowly advanced, the while imitating" the bellowing of a l^ull. Sev- 

 eral other hunters, armed with l)Ows and arrows, were screened by the raised 

 robe. This ruse enabled the hunters to approach very near the herd. If some 

 of the animals did take any alarm at all, they would rarely do more than rise 

 and g-aze curiously at the advancing robe. They would never stampede. 



