NOTES. 579 



" lu the distant northern plains, a hundred miles from the sea, in the 

 midst of the Laplander's village, a young reindeer raises his broad muzzle 

 to the north wind, and stares at the limitless distance while a man may 

 count a hundred. He grows restless from that moment, but he is yet alone. 

 The next day a dozen of the herd look up from the cropping of the moss, 

 sniffing the breeze. Then the Laps nod to one another and the camp grows 

 daily more unquiet. At times the whole herd of young deer stand at gaze, 

 as it were, breathing hard through wide nostrils, then jostling each other 

 and stamping the soft ground. They grow unruly, and it is hard to har- 

 ness them in the light sledge. As the days pass, the Laps watch them 

 more and more closely, well knowing what will happen sooner or later, 

 and then at last, in the northern twilight, the great herd begins to move. 

 The impulse is simultaneous, irresistible, their heads are all turned in one 

 direction. They move slowly at first, biting' still, here and there, at the 

 rich moss. Presently the slow step becomes a trot, they crowd closely 

 together, while the Laps hasten to gather up their last unpacked posses- 

 sions — their cooking utensils and their wooden gods. The great herd 

 break together from a trot to a gallop, from a gallop to a breakneck race, 

 the distant thunder of their united tread reaches the camp during a few 

 minutes, and they are gone to drink of the Polar Sea. The Laps follow 

 after them, dragging painfully their laden sledges in the broad track left 

 by the thousands of galloping beasts — a day's journey, and they are yet 

 far from the sea, and the trail is yet broad. On the second day it grows 

 narrower, and there are stains of blood to be seen ; far on the distant plain 

 before them their sharp eyes distinguish in the direct line a dark motion- 

 less object, another, and another. The race has grown more desperate 

 and more wild as the stampede neared the sea. The weaker reindeer have 

 been thrown down and trampled to death by their stronger fellows. A 

 thousand sharp hoofs have crushed and cut through hide and flesh and 

 bone. Ever swifter and more terrible in their motion, the ruthless herd 

 has raced onward, careless of the slain, careless of food, careless of any 

 drink but the sharp salt water ahead of them. And when at last the 

 Laplanders reach the shore their deer are once more quietly grazing, once 

 more tame and docile, once more ready to drag the sledge whithersoever 

 they are guided. Once in his life the reindeer must taste of the sea in one 

 long, satisfying draught, and if he is hindered he perishes. Neither man 

 nor beast dare stand before him in the hundred miles of his arrow-like 

 path." — A Cigarette- Maker's Romance, vol. ii. pp. 23-25. 



JSfote 58, p. 241. — Migrations of Bisons. 



In regard to the migration of the bison or buffalo, Mr. G. B. Grinnell 

 writes: — "It was once thought that the buffalo performed annually 

 extensive migrations, and it was even said that those which .spent the 

 summer on the banks of the Saskatchewan wintered in Texas. There 

 is no reason for believing this to have been true. Undoubtedly there 

 were slight general movements north and south, and east and west, at 



