212 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE.

attempt to defend themselves, but almost invariably take to
flight. They are extremely fleet, and their sense of smell is
so acute, that they discover an enemy at a great distance,
so that it is difficult to get near them. They are frequently
hunted by the natives, who live principally on their flesh.
When the hunters kill an old dam, they pay no attention
to the calf, as it is sure to remain by its dead mother.
Instances have been known of a mother entering the town
of Cincinnati, followed by its calves. Many of them fall
victims to wolves and grizzly bears. Their beef is of an
excellent quality, and of a very superior flavour.”
Hunting the Hunting the Bison is both a popular sport
Bison. and a lucrative commercial enterprise. The
Indians hunt them for their skins, which they sell as “Buffalo
robes,” the Bison being commonly called a Buffalo by them,
as well as for food. The Rev. J. G. Wood says, “The
hunters take advantage of the gregarious instincts of this
animal, and hunt them when they are collected together in
their vast herds, which blacken the face of the prairie for
miles. Sometimes they form in line, and drive the herd to
the edge of some tall cliff, over which they fall in hundreds,
those behind pushing on those in the van; or sometimes
they form a large circle, driving the animals into a helpless
and leaderless mass, into which the hunters spring, leaving
their horses, and treading with the skill of rope-dancers on
the backs of the bewildered bisons, whom they slaughter as
they pass, stepping from one to the other, and driving the
sharp blade of their spear through the spine of the animal
whose back they have just quitted. When only wounded
the Bison is a most dangerous antagonist, and rushes on its
enemy with the most determined ferocity.”

The Eastern Bison lives in the forests of Bialowesha in
Lithuania under the protection of the Czar of Russia. The
numbers are much smaller than those of North-America but
they are said to be more fierce.