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EARLY BUFFALO MURDER Countless Thousands Sacrificed for the Poorest Leather Ever Marketed Everybody has heard about the buffalo and how numerous they were on the plains years ago but today there are not many men left who know from personal observation how these ungainly wild cattle lived livedFifty Fifty years ago they migrated with the seasons up and down the country from Alberta to Mexico west of the Missouri River almost to the Pacific coast their principal range however being just cast of the Rocky Mountains and eastward to about middle Nebraska Once they ranged clear to Xew York State at least but that was before the white man came cameSixty Sixty years ago they ranged the plains in count ¬ less thousands and practically ceased to exist in 1SST except in Yellowstone Park and one or two other isolated spots where a few head still survive ss is the case on the Flathead River where som of the Allard herd got away and into the mountains while en routa to Canada several years ago In the old days the herds drifted north in the spring and south in the fall following the feed which grew with the seasons seasonsAH AH the plains Indians depended on the buffalo for meat clothes teepee coverings and about all else that they needed for every day life Plenty of buffalo in the country meant happiness and plenty in the Indian camps yhile lack of buffalo in the country meant starvation for the Indian except for what little meat he could get by hunting deer elk and other such animals Antelope usually mi ¬ grated about the same time and along with the buffalo herds so the Indian could not usually get antelope when he couldnt pet buffalo buffaloOne One day the plains would be black with feeding thousands of the big humpbacked animals the next day they might all begin to move south and they would then flow by a given point in a steady liv ¬ ing river of huge cattle the next day it might be impossible to find a single animal within a days ride They came and went drifting over the land as the feed arid water conditions dictated In summer they lived on the high grassy plains of Montana Saskatchewan Alberta and the north thousands and thousands of them In the winter they drifted to the panhandle of Texas Mexico and the arid southwest southwestBUFFALO BUFFALO LEATHER WAS BAD BADNowhere Nowhere in the world has there ever existed so far as mans knowledge runs such an immense herd of magnificent food animals yet we as a nation threw away this supply of beef by killing the herds for their skins Think of it And buf ¬ falo leather was about the poorest excuse for leather that ever was known as it was porous as a sponge though it would wear if rightly tanned like alli ¬ gator hide hideThe The buffalo was a methodical animal if left nn ilisturlxMl Slow moving stupid in a way he asked nothing of life except that he be given plenty of grass water and sunshine Given these he would feed then work his slow way by the easiest grade to the nearest water and anything wet was water to a buffalo drink rest feed drink and rest in never ending cycles from the day he was born to the day some Indian gathered him in and dried his flesh in Uie sun to eat when winter came cameIndians Indians killed buffalo by the thousands at a time by running them over cliffs called piskun by the Blackfeet but they never wasted any meat or hides These big killings by the Indians were simply harvests of meat and skins which they took when they could from migrating herds and cured to last until such time as the herds should drift back but the Indian never wasted or killed need ¬ lessly lesslyThe The feeding habits of buffalo resulted in their moving over the same ground many times there ¬ fore they made deep trails from water to feeding grounds and these trails were always in the shape of a branching tree with the roots to water and the tops or limbs stretching out on the ridges and feeding grounds groundsBy By instinct the big animals followed a low easy grade from the highest point of the feeding grounds to water and this grade was always maintained so buffalo trails always looked as though they had lKen laid out by a civil engineer there was never any abrupt rise or fall in any trail and they were always good roads to follow Indeed the Union Pacific Railroad is practically built on top of a buffalo trail from Omaha to Ogden and somewhat beyond beyondWolves Wolves always hung about the herds ready to pull down kick or disabled animals A wounded buffalo always went to water to die if he could NO every water hole was surrounded with bleached hones They perished by thousands sometimes in crossing high or icy streams but they came and went like the tides until the white man came and killed them needlessly as he does everything Our Dumb Animals r
