As he approached nearer to us we could see his eyes gleaming brightly from beneath the thick masses of hair that hung from his forehead; but there was no trace of that anger or fright such as the hunter sees when in pursuit of a flying herd. The look now was calm and tranquil; the great beast was at home in this solitary waste, as his race through countless generations had been at home here; for in these wilds, so green in summer, so white in winter, he and his had roamed since time began.
“Do not fire at him,” said the Sioux in a low tone to me. “He would be useless to us.”
The old veteran had now come to a halt, about thirty paces in front of where we lay. He was so close to us that we could mark with ease every movement of his shaggy head, every expression of his eye. Some vague idea that there was danger in front seemed to have come upon him, for once or twice he turned his head round, as if to see whether his comrades were close at hand.
As they came closing up to him from behind, the same vague feeling of fear or suspicion seemed to have communicated itself to them, for they also paused irresolute on their way. That the suspicion was not directed towards any particular point, was evident from the looks which the huge animals continued to turn to either side. As thus they stood, gradually closing up from behind upon the leader, a storm that for some time had been threatening, broke over the prairie, whirling snow in dense drifts before it, and wrapping the scene in chaotic desolation.
Truly, a weird wild picture was that before us—the great waste narrowed for the moment by the curtain clouds of wintry tempest, the dark animals vaguely seen through the wrack of drift, and the huge form of the monarch of the prairie standing out against the background of gloom. It is many a long day now since I looked upon that scene, but I see it still before me, through time and distance.
The old buffalo, as though reassured by the proximity of his friends, now began to move forward again.
The Sioux whispered to me to aim at a young bull that had come up towards the front. He was some little way behind the old leader, but his side was partly visible to me. I aimed low behind his shoulder, and fired. In a second, the scene had changed; all was wild confusion among the herd. Where all had been torpor, all became movement; to sense of security followed intense fright; and away in wild stampede, through drift and storm, fled the suddenly startled animals. The young bull had, however, received his death-wound; he soon dropped from the ranks of the flying herd, and lay down to die.
It was now so late in the day that we could not hope to get the beast home to our camp before the morrow. But to leave the dead animal as he was, on the prairies, exposed for the night to the ravage of wolves and foxes, would have been to find little remaining save his bones next day. The Sioux stuck his ramrod into the ribs of the buffalo, and fastened his powder-flask to the rod, letting it swing in the wind. This precaution made the carcase safe from attack, at least for one night; for keener than the scent of food with the wolf is his scent for powder, and he will long continue to circle around meat thus protected, ere his greed will bring him close to it for plunder.
As we rode home to the camp, the snowstorm that had swept the plains abated; but a bitterly cold wind was blowing across the prairie, and a lurid sunset foreshadowed a continuance of wild weather.
The stock of dry wood for fuel was, however, large; and sheltered amid the thickets, our camp-fire blazed brightly, while again we brought back from our long day’s work those keen appetites to relish the good things of steak and bone and tit-bit that only the prairie hunter can ever know. Pleasant used it to be on such nights to sit before the camp fire and watch the wind, as, blowing in gusts, it whirled the yellow flames through the dry logs, while the peeled willows baked by the embers.