THE AMERICAN BISONS. 181 



ized man has met with the larger mammalia in abundance, as has often hap- 

 pened in the experience of explorers and pioneer settlers of newly discov- 

 ered countries, the temptation to slaughter for the mere sake of killing 

 seems rarely to be resisted. In the case of the carnivorous species an 

 exterminating persecution is often pardonable, and to some extent neces- 

 sary. The fur-bearing species, even when hunted to excess, are seldom 

 destroyed wantonly, though often imprudently, the trapper blindly consider- 

 ing only his immediate profits. In the case of the harmless herbivorous 

 species, the ungulates especially, self-interest, it would seem, would prompt 

 an economical treatment of the game in newly settled districts. But the 

 history of America shows that no such principle has here been regarded, 

 where other animals than the buffalo — as the elk, moose, deer, prong-horn, 

 and mountain sheep — have been slaughtered with the utmost recklessness. 

 When stress of weather, for instance, or other circumstances, have brought 

 these animals within the hunter's power, scores and even hundreds have 

 often been killed by single parties already so well supplied with the products 

 of the chase that they had no need for and could make no use of the animals 

 thus destroyed. The buffaloes, from their great numbers and the little tact 

 required in their capture, have probably been the victims of indiscriminate. 

 improvident, and wanton slaughter to a greater extent than any other North 

 American animal. As already stated, thousands are still killed annually 

 merely for so-called '-'sport," no use whatever being made of them; thou- 

 sands of others of which only the tongue or other slight morsel is saved ; 

 hundreds of thousands of others for their hides, which yield the hunter but 

 little more than enough to pay him for the trouble of taking and selling 

 them ; while many more, though escaping from their would-be captors, die 

 of their wounds and yield no return whatever to their murderers.* Of the 

 hundreds of thousands that for the last few years have been annually killed, 

 probably less than a fourth have been to any great extent utilized. "While 

 this wanton and careless waste has ever characterized the contact of the 

 white race with the sluggish and inoffensive bison of our plains and prairies, 

 the Indians have likewise been improvident in their slaughter of this 

 animal, often killing hundreds or even thousands more during their grand 



* Professional buffalo-hunters of the Kansas plains repeatedly assured me that they believe that an 

 average of not more than one in three of the buffaloes killed by them were secured and made use of. 

 From extended observations, however, I felt convinced that Ibis was quite too high an estimate of the pro- 

 portion nnrecovered of those killed. Yet the waste is actually enormous, even in the contingencies of 

 hunting for legitimate purposes, namely, for frontier consumption and shipment to Eastern markets. 



