388 WILD ANIMALS. 



the tracks of countless buffalo, whicli until a few years ago, were 

 wont to roam in vast herds between the Assiniboine and the 

 Saskatchewan, Upon whatever side the eye turns when crossing 

 these great expanses, the same wrecks of the monarch of the 

 prairie lie thickly strewn over the surface. Hundreds of 

 thousands of skeletons dot the short, scant grass; and when 

 fire has laid barer still the level surface, the bleached ribs and 

 skulls of long-killed bison, whiten far and near the dark, burnt 

 prairie." 



An engineer who a short time ago accompanied a surveying 

 expedition across the regions where a few years before buffaloes 

 were to be seen in such numbers that the plains were 

 blackened with them, reported that 6500 carcases were counted 

 in one spot, and a short distance further on hundreds more were 

 found. He also stated that along one of the river-courses there 

 were upwards of two thousand hunters in canips waiting for the 

 buffaloes, and one party of sixteen informed him that they alone 

 had killed no less than 2800 animals during the previous summer. 

 Taking a very much smaller number than this as an average, 

 and still the fearful slaughter remains almost incredible, but 

 conveys the idea of how the millions of buffaloes have been 

 reduced to a few hundreds. 



In the Canadian north-west territories, which were once the 

 limits of the buffaloes' northern migration, and where they were 

 always to be found at certain seasons of the year in enormous 

 numbers, none are now to be seen. On these plains, as elsewhere, 

 they were wantonly slaughtered, not so much by the white men, for 

 the territories were not so easily accessible until lately as other 

 places in the United States where the animals abounded, but by 

 the Indians, instigated by the traders from Montana, who gave 

 them whisky in exchange for hides. In this manner one firm alone 

 is reported as having procured 40,000 skins in a season. But 

 the annual massacre did not effect their extermination on 

 Canadian soil. The remnant of the mighty herds, consisting of 

 many thousands, left these territories about ten years ago on their 

 usual migration southward, and having crossed the international 

 line they never returned. 



