488 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887. 



to tlie settlements around Fort Garry that every settler could hunt inde- 

 pendently ; but as the herds were driven farther and farther away, it 

 required an organized effort and a long journey to reach thein. 



The American Fur Company established trading posts along the 

 Missouri River, one at the mouth of the Teton Eiver and another at 

 the mouth of the Yellowstone. In 1826 a post was established at the 

 eastern base of the Rocky Mountains, at the head of the Arkansas 

 River, and in 1832 another was located in a corresponding situation at 

 the head of the South Fork of the Platte, close to where Denver now 

 stands. Both the latter were on what was then the western border of 

 the buffalo range. Elsewhere throughout the buffalo country there 

 were numerous other posts, always situated as near as possible to the 

 best hunting ground, and at the same time where they would be most 

 accessible to the hunters, both white and red. 



As might be supposed, the Indians were encouraged to kill buffaloes 

 for their robes, and this is what Mr. George Catlin wrote at the mouth 

 of the Teton River (Pyatt County, Dakota) in 1832 concerning this 

 trade:* 



"It seems hard and cruel (does it not?) that we civilized people, with 

 all the luxuries and comforts of the world about us, should be drawing 

 from the backs of these useful animals the skins for our luxury, leaving 

 their carcasses to be devoured by the wolves ; that we should draw from 

 that country some one hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand of 

 their robes annually, the greater part of which are taken from animals 

 that are killed expressly for the robe, at a season when the meat is not 

 cured and preserved, and for each of which skins the Indian has re- 

 ceived but a pint of whisky! Such is the fact, and that number, or 

 near it, are annually destroyed, in addition to the number that is neces- 

 sarily killed for the subsistence of three hundred thousand Indians, who 

 live chiefly upon them." 



The author further declared that the fur trade in those "great west- 

 ern realms" was then limited chiefly to the purchase of buffalo robes. 



1. The Bed Biver half-breeds. — In June, 1840, when the Red River 

 half-breeds assembled at Pembina for their annual expedition against 

 the buffalo, they mustered as follows : 



Carts 1,210 



Hunters 620 \ 



Women 650 Si, 630 



Boys and girls 360 ; 



Horses (buffalo runners) 403 



Dogs 542 



Cart horses 655 



Draught oxen , 586 



Skinning knives 1,240 



The total value of the property employed in this expedition and the 

 working time occupied by it (two months) amounted to tbe enormous 

 sum of £24,000. 



* North American Indians, I, p. 263. 



