THE EXTERMINATION OP THE AMERICAN BISON. 381 



The occurrence of the buffalo at Natchez is recorded,* and also (p. 

 115) at the mouth of Red River, as follows : " We asceuded the Missis- 

 sippi to Pass Manchac, where we killed fifteen buffaloes. The next day 

 we landed again, and killed eight more buffaloes and as many deer." 



The presence of the buffalo iu the Delta of the Mississippi was ob- 

 served and recorded by D'Iberville in 1699.t 



According to Claiborne, J the Choctaws have an interesting tradition 

 in regard to the disappearance of the buffalo from Mississippi. It re- 

 lates that during the early part of the eighteenth century a great 

 drought occurred, which was particularly severe in the prairie region. 

 For three years not a drop of rain fell. The Nowubee and Tombigbee 

 Rivers dried up and the forests perished. The elk and buffalo, which, 

 up to that time had been numerous, all migrated to the country beyond 

 the Mississippi, and never returned. 



Texas. — It will be remembered that it was in southeastern Texas, 

 in all probability within 50 miles of the present city of Houston, that 

 the earliest discovery of the American bison on its native heath was 

 made in 1530 by Oabeza de Vaca, a half-starved, half-naked, and wholly 

 wretched Spaniard, almost the only surviving member of the celebrated 

 expedition which burned its ships behind it. In speaking of the buffalo 

 in Texas at the earliest periods of which we have any historical record, 

 Professor Allen says : u They were also found in immense herds on the 

 coast of Texas, at the Bay of St. Bernard (Matagorda Bay), and on 

 the lower part of the Colorado (Rio Grande, according to some authori- 

 ties), by La Salle, in 1685, and thence northwards across the Colorado, 

 Brazos, and Trinity Rivers. Joutel says that when in latitude 28° 51' 

 " the sight of abundance of goats and bullocks, differing in shape from 

 ours, and running along the coast, heightened our earnestness to be 

 ashore." They afterwards landed in St. Louis Bay (now called Mata- 

 gorda Bay), where they found buffaloes in such numbers on the Colo- 

 rado River that they called it La Riviere aux Boeufs.§ According to 

 Professor Allen, the buffalo did not inhabit the coast of Texas east of 

 the mouth of the Brazos River. 



It is a curious coincidence that the State of Texas, wherein the ear- 

 liest discoveries and observations upon the bison were made, should 

 also now furnish a temporary shelter for one of the last remnants of 

 the great herd. 



Mexico.— In regard to the existence of the bison south of the Rio 

 Grande, in old Mexico, there appears to be but one authority on record, 

 Dr. Berlandier, who at the time of his death left in MS. a work on 

 the mammals of Mexico. At one time this MS. was in the Smithso- 

 nian Institution, but it is there no longer, nor is its fate even ascertain- 



* Ibid., pp. 88-91. 



t Hist. Coll. of Louisiana and Florida, French, second series, p. 58. 



X Mississippi as a Province, Territory, and State, p. 484. 



$ The American Bisons, Living and Extinct, p. 132. 



