122 Liistory of the Buffalo. [ February, 
the christian world (until this discovery) hath not bin made 
acquainted with. These beasts are of the bigness of a cowe, 
their flesh being very good foode, their hide good leather ; their 
fleeces very useful, being a kind of woole, as fine almost as the 
woole of the beaver, and the salvages do make garments thereof. 
It is tenne yeares since first the relation of these things came to 
_the eares of the English.” 
Joliet and Marquette, descending the Mississippi in 1673, saw 
immense herds of buffalo, and the latter thus discourses of them: 
“We call them wild cattle, because they are like our domestic 
cattle, they are not longer, but almost as big again, and more 
corpulent; our men having killed one, three of us had consider- 
erable trouble in moving it. The head is very large, the forehead 
flat and a foot and a-half broad between the horns, which are 
exactly like our cattle, except that they are black and much 
larger. Under the neck there is a kind of large crop hanging 
‘down, and on the back a pretty high hump. The whole head, the — 
neck, and part of the shoulders, are covered with a great mane like ~ 
a horses; it is at least a foot boiig which renders them hideous, © 
and illine over their eyes prevents their seeing before them. The 
rest of the body is covered with a coarse curly hair like the wool 
of our sheep, but much stronger and thicker. It falls in summer, — 
and the skin is then as soft as velvet. At this time the Indians — 
employ the skins to make beautiful robes, which they paint of — 
. various colors.” 4 
The first engraving of the buffalo appeared in the first edition 
of Father Hennepin’s travels. ; 
Jontel in 1685 saw buffale at Bay St. Bernards, and the same e 
year La Salle’s party found them on a river in Texas which they 
named La Vaca, from that circumstance Charlevoix in one part of 
his works calls them “Illinois cattle.” In 1756 some of those — 
who settled in the Abbeville district of South Carolina found 
buffalo there, and in 1774 Bernard Roman speaks of them as a_ 
“benefit of nature conferred on Florida.” In 1769 Daniel Boone 
at the west foot of the Alleghany mountains. Boone remark 
to his companion: “ Job of Uz had not larger droves of cattl 
than we.” Father Venezas does not include the buffalo among 
the animals of California, neither Harmon nor Mackenzie speale 
