2 1 [NDIANS OF THE PLAINS 



When the village has a large number of young men able to bear 

 arms they divide these into three bodies; one takes its route to the 

 right, another thai to the Left, and half of the third partj is divided 



between the two former one-. One of these latter partie- goes away 



[from its main column] a League or thereabout to the right, and the 

 other remains on the Left, both parties forming, each on its own Bide, 

 a Long file: then they set out, in single file, and continue their march 

 until they judge that their line of men is sufficiently long for them to 

 advance into the depths [of the forest]. As they begin their march at 

 midnight, one of the parties waits until dawn, while the others pursue 

 their way; and after they have marched a League or more another 

 party waits again for daylight; the rest march [until) after another 

 half-league has been covered, and Likewise wait. When the day has 

 at last begun, this third party which had separated to the righl and the 

 left with the two others pushes its way farther; and as soon as the 

 rising sun has dried off the dew on the ground, the parties on the right 

 and the left, being in sight of each other, come together in [one] file, 

 and close up the end of the circuit which they intend to surround. 



They commence at once by setting fire to the dried herbage which is 

 abundant in those prairies; those who occupy the flanks do the same; 

 and at that moment the entire village breaks camp, with all the old men 

 and young boys — who divide themselves equally on both sides, move 

 away to a distance, and keep the hunting parties in sight so that they 

 can act with the latter, so that the fires can be lighted on all four sides 

 at once and gradually communicate the flames from one to another. 

 That produces the same effect to the sight as four ranks of palisades, 

 in which the buffaloes are enclosed. When the savages see that the 

 animals are trying to get outside of it, in order to escape the fires which 

 surround them on all sides (and this is the one thing in the world which 

 they most fear), they run at them and compel them to reenter the 

 enclosure; and they avail themselves of this method to kill all the beasts. 

 It is asserted that there are some villages which have secured as many 

 as fifteen hundred buffaloes, and others more or fewer, according to the 

 number of men in each and the size of the enclosure which they make 

 in their hunting. 



The natural inference seems to be that the grass 

 firing and impounding methods of taking buffalo were 

 developed before the introduction of the horse and are 

 therefore the most primitive. The individual hunting 

 of buffalo as well as in small parties was, of course, 



