322 THE UNIVEESE. 



extinguish, when flitting about, the torches carried by the 

 travellers. 



But some mammals, thoiigh placed in circumstances 

 much less favourable than other animals, nevertheless effect 

 migrations, the magnitude of which, and the intelligence 

 they display, awaken astonishment and admiration. 



Nothing presents a more imposing spectacle than the 

 immense troops of bisons which traverse the savannahs 

 of Louisiana. When the time appointed by the decree of 

 Providence arrives, one of these savage mammals constitutes 

 himself chief of the emigrating troop. His roars resound 

 through the vales of the Meschacebe, and he soon gathers 

 round him a formidable troop, ready to follow him across 

 the desert. "When the moment arrives," says Chateau- 

 briand, "the leader, shaking his mane, which hangs from 

 every part over his eyes and curving horns, salutes the 

 setting sun by lowering his head and lifting up his back 

 like a mountain; at the same time a dull sound, the signal 

 of departure, issues from his deep chest, and then all at 

 once he plunges into the foaming waves, followed by the 

 multitude of heifers and bulls which roar lovingly after 

 him." 



The migrations of the squirrels which fill with life the 

 forests of old Scandinavia, if less noisy, are marked by 

 more ingenuity. 



Whilst the formidable bisons overturn everything that 

 lies in their way, colonies of squirrels, timid and silent, 

 encounter a thousand chances in order to establish them- 

 selves far from their natal soil. Travellers assure us that, 

 in America and Lapland, when a river checks their pas- 

 sage, each member of the wandering family transforms 

 some fragment of wood or bark into a raft, displays its 

 large tail to the wind, and the little living flotilla, carried 



