1G0 THE AMERICAN BISONS. 



to a horse or mule, are cut by innumerable hoofs into a series of narrow ter- 

 races, each a buffalo trail. 



" In the whole region just north of the Milk River, absolutely treeless ex- 

 cepting along a part of the stream, and on the Sweet Grass Kills, buffalo 

 chips arc everywhere at hand for fuel. 



'■In descending the Missouri River from Fort Benton, buffalo were seen 

 almost daily during that part of the voyage which embraced the rapid por- 

 tion of the river flowing between the bluffs of the Bad Lands. Small droves 

 were seen surmounting peaks which, it would seem, only a mountain sheep 

 could scale; and in one instance, indeed, the attempt was a failure, and the 

 animal rolled down hill in a cloud of dust. No more were seen below the 

 mouth of the Musselshell, where the Missouri widens and enters a flatter 

 country. The limit on the Missouri corresponds in longitude, in a general 

 way, with that above noted on the parallel of 49'." 



It thus appears that twenty years ago buffaloes were accustomed to fre- 

 quent the whole region between the Missouri River and the 49th parallel, 

 from the western boundary of Dakota, or the 104th meridian, westward to 

 the Rock}' Mountains, occurring even throughout the foot-hills of the latter 

 as well as over the head-waters of the Bitter Root, or St. Mary's River, one 

 of the sources of Clarke's Fork of the Columbia, but that they are now re- 

 stricted to the region between Frenchman's Creek, near the 107th meridian, 

 and the Rocky Mountains, over much of which area their occurrence is 

 merely irregular and more or less fortuitous, their main range being between 

 the 110th and the 112th meridians. 



Region between ///<' Upper Missouri and Plattt Rivers. — It is so well known 

 that the buffalo formerly ranged throughout this region that there is little 

 need nf presenting further evidence Of the fact than will be given incident- 

 ally in tracing the boundaries of their presenl range, and in sketching the 

 history of their extirpation over the greater part of this extensive territory. 

 Beginning at the eastward, we find that Bradbury in 1810, in crossing from 

 the Platte River northward to the Mandan Villages, met with a few buffaloes 

 in what i- now Eastern Nebraska, on the Elk Horn River, and that they 

 were then plentiful on the Canon Ball and Heart Rivers, in what is now 

 Southwestern Dakota.* They lingered in Southwestern Dakota till within 

 ••i veryshorl time. The lost buffalo killed near Fori Rice \\;i- taken in 1869, 



burj (• !•• In. i. Travel* in the Interior • ■( North inn rli ■< in Hi. yowi 1800, 1810, and 1811, pp •'>.'. 

 i. ii. 



