248 MEDICINE-BOW RIVER. 



barous fashion it is. The bulls are never killed for food except in 

 case of necessity, their flesh being very inferior to that of the 

 cows ; but an old mountaineer cannot resist the temptation of a 

 fair shot at one when it offers. 



It is vain to remonstrate against this wholesale destruction. 

 The hunter, this morning, rather plumed himself on his great 

 moderation in only killing four, when it was wholly within his 

 power to kill as many as he pleased : at the same time he knew 

 that one would have amply supplied all our wants. Indeed, of the 

 four killed, but three were butchered, (that is, the choice parts 

 only taken away,) and we left the ground, having two pack-mules 

 and all the riding-horses loaded down with meat, the fourth 

 animal being wholly untouched ; thus abandoning to beasts of 

 prey enough of the richest and sweetest beef to supply a very 

 respectable market for a week. All intercession in favour of the 

 poor buffalo is looked upon by these old mountain-men with a. 

 strange mixture of wonder and contempt, which strongly reminded 

 me of the expression of honest Dandie Dinmont, in Scott's ad- 

 mirable tale of Guy Mannering : " Weel, that's queer aneugh ! 

 Lord save us ! to care about a brock !" 



The train, in the mean time, had moved forward, ascending a 

 dry branch of Rattlesnake Creek, running E. N. E., with a 

 gradual rise. Reaching its head, in a low gap, we attained the 

 summit, and struck upon a hollow or depression leading down to a 

 small branch, which, rising near the northern end of Medicine- 

 bow Butte, winds its way through a broad and lovely valley, and 

 discharges its waters into the Medicine-bow River. 



The route led us over some swelling ridges making toward this 

 branch from the mountains on our right, and, crossing three other 

 little streams, tributary to it, we reached in ten and a-half miles 

 the banks of the Medicine-bow River. Here we encamped in a 

 thicket of tall timber and underbrush, on an old Indian camp- 

 ground; the remains of several old forts, now decayed and in 

 ruins, being still visible. 



On its north-western, northern, and north-eastern sides, the 

 Medicine-bow Butte is surrounded by a well-defined ridge, from 

 which it is separated by a broad intervening valley, the ridge ap- 

 pearing to be concentric with this part of the butte, and three or 

 four miles distant from it. Through this the Medicine-bow River 

 breaks, passing for twenty miles between vertical walls of rock 

 with wide alternate bottoms On either side. 



