Fes., 1912. Mammats or ILtinois anD Wisconsin — Cory. 93 
in South Carolina on the Seaboard and we were informed that from 
the last herd seen in that state two were killed in the vicinity of Colum- 
bia. It thus appears that at one period this animal ranged over nearly 
the whole of North America.”’ (J. ¢., p. 55.) 
Caton writes,* “When Hennepin and Lasalle first visited Illinois 
two hundred years ago, the bison abounded in prodigious numbers, 
although the whole country was occupied by Indian tribes who, to a 
great extent, lived upon them. For the next hundred years but few 
white men visited the country and scarcely any settled in it and yet in 
that time nearly all the Bison had crossed the Mississippi River; and 
after a most dilligent research I cannot learn that one has been seen 
in Illinois for the last 85 or 90 years. The last bison were observed in 
Illinois between 1780 and 1790.” 
That they were found at a later date than this in Illinois is shown 
by the statements of others. 
André Michaux, in writing of his travels in southern Illinois, (be- 
tween Kaskaskia and Fort Massac) says, ‘“The 7th of October, 1795, 
my guide killed a Buffalo which he considered to be about four years 
old.... Thursday the 8th saw another Buffalo thirty toises from our 
road.”’t 
Woods (1822) refers to animals frequenting the salt licks at Birk’s 
Prairie, Illinois, and says: ‘‘The places were first used by the buffaloes, 
that some years ago used to frequent the prairies. A man, who resides 
at Birk’s Prairie informed me, that eight or nine years since, he often 
visited the Prairies, as he was then employed, with many others, during 
a war with the Indians, to be on the look-out for them, and then he 
often saw both elks and buffaloes, but they were not numerous, as 
the country became settled, they moved off to the large prairies to the 
north and west.’’t 
At the time of the visit of Maximilian, Prince of Wied-Neuwied, 
(1832-34) he informs us that Buffalo were no longer to be found in 
southern Illinois. He says, ‘‘The country on the banks of the Wabash 
is as interesting to the zodlogist as to the botanist. Formerly there 
were great numbers of the bison or buffalo of the Anglo-Americans, 
the elks, bear, and beaver; but they are now entirely extirpated.’ § 
In Wisconsin according to Dr. Hoy it was found at a much later 
* Antelope and Deer of America, 1877, 72. 
{ Michaux, André. Travels into Kentucky, 1795-1796. pipnttetion in 
Thwaites’s Early Western Travels, III, 1904, p. 73-) 
t Woods, J. Two Years’ Residence in the Settlement on English Baie in the 
Illinois Country, 1820-1821 (1822), pp. 165-166. 
§ Maximilian, Prince of Wied-Neuwied. Voyage in the interior of North 
America, Lloyd edition, 1833 (1843), p. 76. 
