through it to the outside, they will rush against it, and their great weight and strength make it easy for them to break down any but a heavy wall.  Mr. Hugh Monroe tells me that he has seen a pis’kun built of willow brush; and the Cheyennes have stated to me that their buffalo corrals were often built of brush.  Sometimes, if the walls of the pis’kun were not high, the buffalo tried to jump or climb over them, and, in doing this, might break them down, and some or all escape.  As soon, however, as the animals were in the corral, the people—­women and children included—­ran up and showed themselves all about the walls, and by their cries kept the buffalo from pressing against the walls.  The animals ran round and round within, and the men standing on the walls shot them down as they passed.  The butchering was done in the pis’kun, and after this was over, the place was cleaned out, the heads, feet, and least perishable offal being removed.  Wolves, foxes, badgers, and other small carnivorous animals visited the pis’kun, and soon made away with the entrails.

In winter, when the snow was on the ground, and the buffalo were to be led to the pis’kun, the following method was adopted to keep the herd travelling in the desired direction after they had got between the wings of the chute.  A line of buffalo chips, each one supported on three small sticks, so that it stood a few inches above the snow, was carried from the mouth of the pis’kun straight out toward the prairie.  The chips were about thirty feet apart, and ran midway between the wings of the chute.  This line was, of course, conspicuous against the white snow, and when the buffalo were running down the chute, they always followed it, never turning to the right nor to the left.  In the latter days of the pis’kun, the man who led the buffalo was often mounted on a white horse.

Often, when they drove the buffalo over a high vertical cliff, no corral was built beneath.  Most of those driven over were killed or disabled by the fall, and only a few got away.  The pis’kuns, as a rule, were built under low-cut bluffs, and sometimes the buffalo were driven in by moonlight.

In connection with the subject of leading or decoying the buffalo, another matter not generally known may be mentioned.  Sometimes, as a matter of convenience, a herd was brought from a long distance close up to the camp.  This was usually done in the spring of the year, when the horses were thin in flesh and not in condition to stand a long chase.  I myself have never seen this; but my friend, William Jackson, was once present at such a drive by the Red River half-breeds, and has described to me the way in which it was done.

The camp was on Box Elder Creek near the Musselshell River.  It was in the spring of 1881, and the horses were all pretty well run down and thin, so that their owners wished to spare them as much as possible.  The buffalo were seven or eight miles distant, and two men were sent out to bring them to the camp.  Other men, leading fresh horses, went with them, and hid themselves among the hills at different points along the course that the buffalo were expected to take, at intervals of a mile and a half.  They watched the herd, and were on hand to supply the fresh horses to the men who were bringing it.