100 
ANIMALS OF NORTH AMERICA. 
the old. In the attempt to cross, the bison is often insulated 
on a cake of ice that floats down the river. • The savages 
select the most favorable points for attack, and as the 
bison approaches, the Indians leap with wonderful agility 
over the frozen ice to attack him. As the animal is neces- 
sarily unsteady, and his footing very insecure on the ice, he 
soon receives his death-wound, and is drawn triumphantly 
to the shore. 
The numbers of this species are surprisingly great, when 
we consider the immense destruction of them since European 
weapons have been used against them : they are however 
fast disappearing before civilization, equally with the Indian 
himself ; and the time is probably not far distant, when both 
will only be known in the annals of history. They were 
once extensively diffused over what is now United States 
territory, but at the present time their range is very dif- 
ferent, being confined to the remote unsettled districts of 
the north and west, being rarely seen east of the Mississippi, 
or south of the St. Lawrence. West of Lake Winnipeg they 
are found as far north as 62° ; west of the Rocky Mountains 
seldom farther north than the Columbia River. The greats 
plains of the Saskatchewan, and the Red River still abound 
with them, though the herds are less numerous every year. 
The first description given of the Bison is by Thoma s 
Morton, A. D. 1637, in a work entitled “ New Canaan.” 
He says, that the Indians u have also made great description 
of herds of w 7 ell grown beasts that live about the parts of this 
lake (Ontario,) such as the Christian worlduntil this discovery 
hath not been made acquainted with. These beasts are of 
the bigness of a cow, their fleeces very useful, being a kind 
of wool, and the savages do make garments thereof,” &c. 
Mackenzie alludes to a wdiite buffalo, during his explora- 
tions, said by the Indians to be numerous in Oregon ; this 
probably was the Rocky Mountain sheep, known to them 
under that name. 
