386 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887. 



of " The American Bisons/ 7 page 107, he gives the following testimony 

 and conclusions on this point : 



" The occurrence of a stream in western New York, called Buffalo 

 Creek, which empties into the eastern end of Lake Erie, is commonly 

 viewed as traditional evidence of its occurrence at this point, but posi- 

 tive testimony to this eff<. ct has thus far escaped me. 



" This locality, if it actually came so far eastward, must have formed 

 the eastern limit of its range along the lakes. I have found only highly 

 questionable allusions to the occurrence of buffaloes along the southern 

 shore of Lake Ontario. Keating, on the authority of Colhoun, how- 

 ever, has cited a passage from Morton's "New English Canaan" as 

 proof of their former existence in the neighborhood of this lake. Mor- 

 ton's statement is based on Indian reports, and the context gives suffi- 

 cient evidence of the general vagueness of his knowledge of the region 

 of which he was speaking. The passage, printed in 1637 is as follows : 

 They [the Indians] have also made descriptions of great hoards of 

 well growne beasts that live about the parts of this lake [Erocoise] such 

 as the Christian world (untill this discovery) hath not bin made ac- 

 quainted with. These Beasts are of the bignesse of a Cowe, their flesh 

 being very good foode, their hides good lether, their fleeces very usefull, 

 being a kindeof wolle as fine almost as the wolle of the Beaver, and the 

 Salvages doe make garments thereof. It is tenne yeares since first the 

 relation of these things came to the eares of the English.' The * beast' 

 to which allusion is here made [says Professor Allen] is unquestionably 

 the buffalo, but the locality of Lake ' Erocoise' is not so easily settled. 

 Colhoun regards it, and probably correctly, as identical with Lake 

 Ontario. * * * The extreme northeastern limit of the former range 

 of the buffalo seems to have been, as above stated, in western New 

 York, near the eastern end of Lake Erie. That it probably ranged 

 thus far there is fair evidence." 



Pennsylvania. — From the eastern end of Lake Erie the boundary 

 of the bison's habitat extends south into western Pennsylvania, to a 

 marsh called Buffalo Swamp on a map published by Peter Kalm in 

 1771. Professor Allen says it u is indicated as situated between the 

 Alleghany Eiver and the W est Branch of the Susquehanna, near the 

 heads of the Licking and Toby's Creeks (apparently the streams now 

 called Oil Creek and Clarion Creek)." In this region there were at one 

 time thousands of buffaloes. While there is not at hand any positive 

 evidence that the buffalo ever inhabited the southwestern portion of 

 Pennsylvania, its presence in the locality mentioned above, and in West 

 Virginia generally, on the south, furnishes sufficient reason for extend- 

 ing the boundary so as to include the southwestern portion of the State 

 and connect with our starting point, the District of Columbia. 



