312 SCARCITY OF BUFFALO. 



afterwards enticed on by an occasional fagged 

 animal, which we were compelled to leave 

 behind, as well as by the bones and scraps of 

 food, which they picked up about our camps. 

 Not a few of them paid the penalty of their 



lives for their temerity. 



Had we not fortunately been supplied with 

 a sufficiency of meat and other provisions, 

 we might have suffered of hunger before 

 reaching the settlements ; for we saw no buf- 

 falo after crossing the Arkansas river. It is 

 true that, owing to their disrelish for the long 

 dry grass of the eastern prairies, the buffalo 

 are rarely found so far east in autumn as dur- 



spring; yet I never saw them so 

 this resrion before. In fact, at all 



m 



a 



scarce 



& 



5, they are usually very abundant as far 

 east as our point of leaving the Arkansas river. 

 Upon reaching the settlements, 1 had an 

 opportunity of experiencing a delusion which 

 had been the frequent subject of remark by 

 travellers on the Prairies before. Accustoined 

 as we had been for some months to our little 

 mules, and the equally small-sized Mexican 

 ponies, our sight became so adjusted to their 

 proportions, that when we came to look up- 

 on the commonest hackney of our frontier 

 horses, it appeared to be almost a monster. 

 I have frequently heard exclamations of this 

 kind from the new arrivals:— "How the 

 Missourians have improved their breed of 

 horses !"—« What a huge gelding !"—"l^id^ 

 you ever see such an animal !" This delu- 

 sion is frequently availed of by the frontiers- 



