American Big Game in Its Haunts | Page 7

Before reaching the Mammoth Hot Springs we also saw a number of
ducks in the little pools and on the Gardiner. Some of them were rather
shy. Others--probably those which, as Major Pitcher informed me, had
spent the winter there--were as tame as barnyard fowls.
[Illustration: DEER ON THE PARADE GROUND.]
Just before reaching the post the Major took me into the big field where
Buffalo Jones had some Texas and Flat Head Lake buffalo--bulls and

cows--which he was tending with solicitous care. The original stock of
buffalo in the Park have now been reduced to fifteen or twenty
individuals, and the intention is to try to mix them with the score of
buffalo which have been purchased out of the Flat Head Lake and
Texas Panhandle herds. The buffalo were put within a wire fence,
which, when it was built, was found to have included both black-tail
and white-tail deer. A bull elk was also put in with them at one
time--he having met with some accident which made the Major and
Buffalo Jones bring him in to doctor him. When he recovered his health
he became very cross. Not only would he attack men, but also buffalo,
even the old and surly master bull, thumping them savagely with his
antlers if they did anything to which he objected. When I reached the
post and dismounted at the Major's house, I supposed my experiences
with wild beasts for the day were ended; but this was an error. The
quarters of the officers and men and the various hotel buildings, stables,
residences of the civilian officials, etc., almost completely surround the
big parade ground at the post, near the middle of which stands the
flag-pole, while the gun used for morning and evening salutes is well
off to one side. There are large gaps between some of the buildings, and
Major Pitcher informed me that throughout the winter he had been
leaving alfalfa on the parade grounds, and that numbers of black-tail
deer had been in the habit of visiting it every day, sometimes as many
as seventy being on the parade ground at once. As springtime came on
the numbers diminished. However, in mid-afternoon, while I was
writing in my room in Major Pitcher's house, on looking out of the
window I saw five deer on the parade ground. They were as tame as so
many Alderney cows, and when I walked out I got up to within twenty
yards of them without any difficulty. It was most amusing to see them
as the time approached for the sunset gun to be fired. The notes of the
trumpeter attracted their attention at once. They all looked at him
eagerly. One then resumed feeding, and paid no attention whatever
either to the bugle, the gun or the flag. The other four, however,
watched the preparations for firing the gun with an intent gaze, and at
the sound of the report gave two or three jumps; then instantly
wheeling, looked up at the flag as it came down. This they seemed to
regard as something rather more suspicious than the gun, and they
remained very much on the alert until the ceremony was over. Once it

was finished, they resumed feeding as if nothing had happened. Before
it was dark they trotted away from the parade ground back to the
mountains.
The next day we rode off to the Yellowstone River, camping some
miles below Cottonwood Creek. It was a very pleasant camp. Major
Pitcher, an old friend, had a first-class pack train, so that we were as
comfortable as possible, and on such a trip there could be no pleasanter
or more interesting companion than John Burroughs--"Oom John," as
we soon grew to call him. Where our tents were pitched the bottom of
the valley was narrow, the mountains rising steep and cliff-broken on
either side. There were quite a number of black-tail in the valley, which
were tame and unsuspicious, although not nearly as much so as those in
the immediate neighborhood of the Mammoth Hot Springs. One
mid-afternoon three of them swam across the river a hundred yards
above our camp. But the characteristic animals of the region were the
elk--the wapiti. They were certainly more numerous than when I was
last through the Park twelve years before.
[Illustration: WHISKEY JACKS.]
In the summer the elk spread all over the interior of the Park. As winter
approaches they divide, some going north and others south. The
southern bands, which, at a guess, may possibly include ten thousand
individuals, winter out of the Park, for the most part in Jackson's
Hole--though of course here and there within the limits of the Park a
few elk may spend both winter and summer in an unusually favorable
location. It was the members of