ver. Like Lewis and Clark, Pike found the
country literally swarming with game; for all the great plains region,
from the Saskatchewan to the Rio Grande, formed at this time one of the
finest hunting grounds to be found in the whole world. At one place just
on the border of the plains Pike mentions that he saw from a hill
buffalo, elk, antelope, deer, and panther, all in sight at the same
moment. When he reached the plains proper the three characteristic
animals were the elk, antelope, and, above all, the buffalo.

The Bison.

The myriads of huge shaggy-maned bison formed the chief feature in this
desolate land; no other wild animal of the same size, in any part of the
world, then existed in such incredible numbers. All the early travellers
seem to have been almost equally impressed by the interminable seas of
grass, the strange, shifting, treacherous plains rivers, and the
swarming multitudes of this great wild ox of the West. Under the blue
sky the yellow prairie spread out in endless expanse; across it the
horseman might steer for days and weeks through a landscape almost as
unbroken as the ocean. It was a region of light rainfall; the rivers ran
in great curves through beds of quicksand, which usually contained only
trickling pools of water, but in times of freshet would in a moment fill
from bank to bank with boiling muddy torrents. Hither and thither across
these plains led the deep buffalo-trails, worn by the hoofs of the herds
that had passed and re-passed through countless ages. For hundreds of
miles a traveller might never be out of sight of buffalo. At noon they
lay about in little groups all over the prairie, the yellow calves
clumsily frisking beside their mothers, while on the slight mounds the
great bulls moaned and muttered and pawed the dust. Towards nightfall
the herds filed down in endless lines to drink at the river, walking at
a quick, shuffling pace, with heads held low and beards almost sweeping
the ground. When Pike reached the country the herds were going south
from the Platte towards their wintering grounds below the Arkansas. At
first he passed through nothing but droves of bulls. It was not until he
was well towards the mountains that he came upon great herds of cows.

Other Game.

The prairie was dotted over with innumerable antelope. These have always
been beasts of the open country; but the elk, once so plentiful in the
great eastern forests, and even now plentiful in parts of t