Bison
Bison
Asthere has lately been an exhibition of a number of bisons through New England, and as no doubt many of our readers have seen them, we think it will amuse them, particularly, to learn something about the manners, habits and nature of these creatures. We hope, too, that all others who may look into our pages, may find it agreeable to read a description of such extraordinary animals.
The bison is very different from the European buffalo,—the latter having very long, spreading horns. The buffalo is also a more fierce and daring animal. Our bison is as large as the largest ox, and roams in vast herds over the prairies of the west. Sometimes several thousand are seen in a flock, and as they proceed, fighting, lowing, leaping, and tearing the earth with their horns, the noise is terrific. The earth at such a time seems to tremble as if shaken by an earthquake. The bison is not now found east of the Mississippi, though it probably inhabited in former times, the whole country to the shores of the Atlantic. It bears considerable resemblance to the German Aurochs. Its horns are short, and it has a prodigious hump over the shoulders. The head, shoulders, and upper parts are covered with long, brownish, woolly hair. The tail is tufted with black.
These animals, while feeding, scatter themselves over the country, but when moving, they form a dense column, which, once in motion, is scarcely to be impeded. Their line of march is seldom interrupted, even by considerable rivers, across which they swim, without fear or hesitation, in the order in which they traverse the plains. They constantly wander about, either from being disturbed by the hunters, or in search of food. They are very fond of the soft and tender grass, which springs up after a fire has spread over the prairie. In winter they scrape away the snow, to reach thegrass. They are timid and fly from man, but when wounded, they become desperate and dangerous. The Indians make incessant war upon them for their flesh and skins. Their favorite method of attack, is to ride up to the fattest of the herd on horseback, and shoot them. Sometimes they drive them over precipices, by which they are killed. They also take them in enclosures made of sticks, about a hundred yards in diameter. The herds are attended by packs of wolves, ready to fall upon the sick and wounded. Travellers describe the noise made by the bellowing, the trampling, and galloping of a large herd of bisons, as impressing the mind with an emotion amounting to terror. The bison was the only native animal of the ox kind found by the first settlers in America.
Anecdote.—In a town of western Virginia, a few years ago, an old lady from the country went to a store to procure a few articles. She purchased several of the clerk, and at length, observing a neatly painted and varnished bellows hanging by the post, she inquired what it was. The clerk, perceiving that the old lady was rather ignorant, and being something of a wag, informed her that it was a new-fashioned fan, which he had lately received from the east; at the same time taking the bellows down and puffing with it in his face, told her that was the mode of operation. The old woman repeated the operation on herself, and was so delighted with the new fan, that she purchased it forthwith and departed.
On the next day, the minister had an appointment to preach at a neighboring school-house in the country. The congregation being assembled, while the minister was in the act of reading the first hymn, who should pop in but the old lady with her new-fashioned fan, and having taken her seat, immediately commenced puffing away in good earnest! The congregation knew not what to make of it—some smiled, and some looked astonished; but the ludicrous prevailed over everything else, and to such an extent, that the minister himself was obliged to stop reading, and hand the book to his brother in the desk. After the usual preliminary services, he rose to preach, but there sat the lady with the bellows, and a hand hold of each handle, the nose turned up towards her face, and with much self-complacency puffing the gentle breeze in her face. What to do, or how to proceed, he knew not, for he could not cast his eyes over the congregation without meeting with the old lady. At length, summoning resolution, and trying to feel the solemnity of the duty imposed on him, he proceeded. He finished his discourse, but it cost him more effort than any sermon before or since.—Mt. Vernon Watchman.
A Pious Mother.—It is said, that, in the hand of one of the mummies found in a pyramid, was discovered a bulbous root, which being placed in the earth, grew and bloomed a beautiful but unknown flower, after having been buried for many hundred years. So may the good seed of God spring up after many years. We mention a case in point. Some years since, a venerable old man, upwards of one hundred years old, was the subject of converting grace in an American state. The cause of his conversion was hearing a text of Scripture, which his pious mother had taught him in England, one hundred years before!
“Though seed lie buried long in dust;It shan’t deceive our hope;The precious grain shall ne’er be lost,For grace insures the crop.”
“Though seed lie buried long in dust;It shan’t deceive our hope;The precious grain shall ne’er be lost,For grace insures the crop.”
“Though seed lie buried long in dust;It shan’t deceive our hope;The precious grain shall ne’er be lost,For grace insures the crop.”
“Though seed lie buried long in dust;
It shan’t deceive our hope;
The precious grain shall ne’er be lost,
For grace insures the crop.”