The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-06

what methods were employed. The 1 natural fatalities were compared to the enormous numbers. The COW bison dis- 1 plays little affection for her young, and many calves were lost every year; but, all in all, the conditions were extremely favorable to them, and their increase was enormous Many were destroyed by stampeding over precipices. In 1867, 2,0OO buffaloes or half a herd, became entangled in the quicksands of the Platte river. At another time herd was lost by breaking through the ice of Lac Qui Parle in Minnesota. The cold winters sometimes killed many that remained in the far North; but these
 dangers were as nothing compared to man. Men soon found that the buffa- loes had a value The Indians slaugh- tered them by the thousand for their skins, bone and food they killed 100 oftentimes to secure five and waste and prodigality was the rule. Yet so vast
 were their numbers that doubtless the
 Indian inroads upon them had little ef-
 feet so far as extirmination is concern
 ed. But with the white man is was diff
 ferent. Some wished to make records,
 and killed for sport; some killed for
 the heads and hides; some became pro-
 fessional buffalo butchers to provide the
 gangs of railroad men with meat,
 saughtering a magnificent animal for
 it's tongue alone. It has been estimated
 that previous to 1870 nearly three-quar-
 ters of a million buffaloes could have
 been killed yearly and the herds kept
 intact; how many were killed and vast
 ed will never be known, Each ami
 mal however, had value at this time
 estimated by Hornaday at $5; the robe,
 $2,50, the tongue, g cents; hindquarter
 meat, $2; bones, horns and hoofs, 25
 cents; and this was sufficient to attract
 an army of destroyer6, The hides were
 the greatest feature, and one firm, in
 New York between 1876 and 1884 paid
 the killers nearly s1,0o0,000, or to be ex-
 act, S923,070 for the robes and hides,
 which represents the final extinction of
 the animal The Government never in-
 terfered, owing to protests of interested
 legislators and the neglect of higher
 officials, Another firm paid $216,000 for robes and skins, and there were scores
 of private traders in the field. The
 word went out to kill everything in SiSAt, anu HUH IoiD llltlS was III iSC on the head of every buffalo.
 It is a dark and disagreeable subject to probe, but it is interesting to note some of the methods of the national calamity makers. A band of half- breeds in two hunts, according to Ross, killed 47,700 buffaloes, 620 men being en- gagged in the sport, out which about 30, GOO animals were wasted or partly eat en- Hornaday estimates from 1920 to 1925 five buffalo expeditions went out composed of 610 carts each, killing 11S,- $50 buffaloes From 1925 to 1880 five ex- petitions, of 750 carts each, killed 146, y i 250 buffaloes. From 1895 to 1S40 fifty- four expeditions, of 1090 carts each, l killed 212,350 buffaloes. Total number killed by the Red River half-breeds alone in twenty years 625275, valued at 3.26l375. An interesting table has been furnished the government by the firm mentioned, J. X I Boskowitz, showing the decline of the buffalo as an article of commerce. It shows that in nine years this firm handled 246,t75 skins, costing S924.790. Tn 1878 they re- ceived 41,26S robes; in 1883, 5000: in 1884 none. The end had come. And the buff falo was a memory. Another dealer, Joseph Ullman. states that in 1881 he handled 4l000 robes, valued at S3.50 and