400 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887 



All of them ran the moment they discovered their enemies. Two were 

 shot and killed. One was caught by a cowboy named Horace Brodhurst, 

 ear marked, and turned loose. The fifth one was caught in September 

 on the Porcupine Creek round-up. He was then about five months 

 old, and being abundantly able to travel he showed a clean pair of heels. 

 It took three fresh horses, one after another, to catch him, and his final 

 capture was due to exhaustion, and not to the speed of any of his pur- 

 suers. The distance covered by the chase, from the point where his 

 first pursuer started to where the third one finally lassoed him, was 

 considered to be at least 15 miles. But the capture came to naught, for 

 on the following day the calf died from overexertion and want of milk. 



Colonel Dodge states that the very young calves of a herd have to 

 depend upon the old bulls for protection, and seldom in vain. The 

 mothers abandon their offspring on slight provocation, and even none 

 at all sometimes, if we may judge from the condition of the little waif 

 that fell into our hands. Had its mother remained with it, or even in 

 its neighborhood, we should at least have seen her, but she was nowhere 

 within a radius of 5 miles at the time her calf was discovered. Nor did 

 she return to look for it, as two of us proved by spending the night in 

 the sage-brush at the very spot where the calf was taken. Colonel 

 Dodge declares that "the cow seems to possess scarcely a trace of ma- 

 ternal instinct, and, when frightened, will abandon and run away from 

 her calf without the slightest hesitation. * * * When the calves 

 are young they are always kept in the center of each small herd, while 

 the bulls dispose themselves on the outside."* 



Apparently the maternal instinct of the cow buffalo was easily mas- 

 tered by fear. That it was often manifested, however, is proven by the 

 following from Audubon and Bach man : t 



" Buffalo calves are drowned from being unable to ascend the steep 

 banks of the rivers across which they have just swam, as the cows can- 

 not help them, although they stand near the bank, and will not leave 

 them to their fate unless something alarms them. 



u On one occasion Mr. Kipp, of the American Fur Company, caught 

 eleven calves, their dams all the time standing near the top of the bank. 

 Frequently, however, the cows leave the young to their fate, when most 

 of them perish. In connection with this part of the subject, we may add 

 that we were informed, when on the Upper Missouri River, that when the 

 banks of that river were practicable for cows, and their calves could not 

 follow them, they went down again, after having gained the top, and 

 would remain by them until forced away by the cravings of hunger. 

 When thus forced by the necessity of saving themselves to quit their 

 young, they seldom, if ever, return to them. When a large herd of 

 these wild animals are crossing a river, the calves or yearlings manage 

 to get on the backs of the cows, and are thus conveyed safely over/ 



* Plains of the Great West, pp. 124, 125. 



t Quadrupeds of North America, vol. n, pp. 38, 39. 



