University of Virginia Library

OUR FIRST BUFFALO STEAK.

On the confines of the buffalo hunting-grounds,
migrated a family, consisting of a strange mixture
of enterprise and idleness, of ragged-looking men
and homely women. They seemed to have all the
bad habits of the Indians, with none of their redeeming
qualities. They were willing to live without
labour, and subsist upon the bounties of nature. Located
in the fine climate of Northern Texas, the
whole year was to them little else than a continued
spring, and the abundance of game with which they
were surrounded afforded what seemed to them all
the comforts of life. The men never exerted themselves
except when hunger prompted, or a spent
magazine made the acquisition of “peltries” necessary
to barter for powder and ball. A more lazy,
contemptible set of creatures never existed, and we
would long since have forgotten them, had not our
introduction to them associated itself with our first
buffalo steak.

It was a matter of gratulation to my companions
as well as myself, that, after sleeping on the open

prairies, over which we had been travelling for many
days, we discovered ahead of us what evinced the
location of a “squatter.” A thousand recollections
of the comforts of civilized life pressed upon us before
we reached the abode. We speculated upon the
rich treat of delicacies which we should enjoy. A
near inspection at once dispelled our illusions.
A large rudely-constructed shed, boarded up on the
northern side, was all we found. Upon nearer examination,
it appeared that this “shed” was the
common dwelling-place of the people described
above, with the addition of two cows, several goats,
poultry, and, as we soon after discovered, three
horses. Immediately around the caravansera the
prairie grass struggled for a sickly growth. As you
entered it, you found yourself growing deeper and
deeper in a fine dust, that had been in the course of
time worked out of the soil. Some coarse blankets
were suspended through the enclosure, as retiring
rooms for the women. On the ground were strewn
buffalo skins, from which the animal inhabitants kept
aloof. We entered without seeing a human being.
After some delay, however, a little nondescript, with
a white sunburnt head, thrust aside the blankets,
and hallooed out, “They ain't injuns.” The mother
then showed herself. She was as far removed from
feminine as possible, and appeared as unmoved at
our presence as the post that sustained the roof of
her house. We asked for lodging and food; she
nodded a cold assent and disappeared. Not disposed
to be fastidious, we endeavoured to make ourselves
as comfortable as possible, and wait for the developement
of coming events. In the course of an hour a
woman younger than the first made her appearance,
somewhat attractive because younger. On hearing
the detail of our wants, she wrinkled her soiled
visage into a distorted smile, and told us that the
“men” would soon be home with “buffalo meat,”
and then our wants should be attended to.

Whatever might have been our disappointment
at what we saw around us, the name of buffalo meat
dispelled it all. The great era in our frontier wanderings
was about to commence, and with smiles
from our party that for expression would have done
credit to rival belles, we lounged upon the skins
upon the ground. It is needless for us to say what
were our ideas of the “men,” soon to make their
appearance. Buffalo hunters of course, tall, fine-looking
fellows, active as cats, mounted upon wild
steeds, armed with terrible rifles, and all the paraphernalia
of the hunter's art. The Dutch angels, that
figure so conspicuously on many a gem of art in the
“Lowlands,” are certainly not farther removed
from the beautiful creations of Milton, than were
the buffalo hunters that we saw from the standard
our imagination and reading had conjured up.

Two short, ill-formed men, with bow-legs, long
bodies, and formidable shocks of red hair, destitute
of intelligence, clothed in skins, and moving with
shuffling gaits, were the realities of our conceptions.
Whatever might have been the charms of their faces,
our admiration was absorbed in viewing their nether
garments. They were made of undressed deer-skin,
the hair worn outside. When first made, they were

of the length of pantaloons, but the drying qualities
of the sun had, in course of time, no doubt imperceptibly
to the wearers, shortened them into the
dignity of breeches. To see these worthies standing
up was beyond comparison ridiculous. They seemed
to have had immense pummels fastened to their
knees and seats. Under other circumstances, the
tailor craft of the frontier would have elicited great
merriment; but a starving stomach destroys jokes.
Courtesies suitable were exchanged, and the preliminaries
for a hearty meal agreed upon, the basis of
which was to be buffalo steaks.

A real buffalo steak! eaten in the very grounds
which the animal inhabits! What romance! what a
diploma of a sportsman's enterprise! Whatever
might have been my disappointment in the hunters,
I knew that meat was meat, and that the immutable
laws of nature would not fail, though my notions
of the romantic in men were entirely disappointed.
A promise that our wants should soon be supplied
brought us to that unpleasant time, in every-day life,
that prefaces an expected and wished-for meal.
Seated, like barbarians, upon the floor, myself and
companions had the pleasing mental operation of
calculating how little the frontier family we were
visiting were worth for any moral quality, and the
physical exercise of keeping off, as much as possible,
thousands of fleas and other noxious insects that composed
part of the dust in which we sat. While thus
disposed of, the “hunters” were busy in various ways
about the premises, and received from us the elegant
names of “Bags” and “Breeches,” from some

fancied or real difference in their inexpressibles.
“Breeches,” who was evidently the business man,
came near where we were sitting, and threw down
upon the ground, what appeared, at a superficial
glance, to be an enormous pair of saddle-bags. He
then asked his companion in arms for a knife, to
cut off the strangers some buffalo steaks. Now if
the nondescript before me had as coolly proposed to
cut steaks off an ill-natured cur that was wistfully
eyeing the saddle-bags, no more surprise could have
been exhibited by my companions than was, when
they heard the suggestion.

The knife was brought, and “Breeches” made an
essay at cutting up the saddle-bags, which gave him,
dressed as he was in skins, the appearance of a wild
robber just about to search the effects of some
murdered traveller. The work progressed bravely,
and, to our surprise, soon were exhibited crude
slices of meat. What we saw was the fleshy parts
of a buffalo's hams, ingeniously connected together
by the skin that passed over the back of the animal,
and so dissected from the huge frame as to enable
it easily to be brought “into camp.” As the
sounds that accompany the frying of meat saluted
our ears, we moved into the open air, to avoid
the certain knowledge that we were about to complete
the eating of the peck of dirt, said to be necessary
before we die. Before the door were the
two horses belonging to our hosts, just as they returned
from the hunt, and upon one still reposed the
huge pieces of meat, thus simply, and frontier-like,
held together for transportation.

Our first buffalo steak disappointed us. The romance
of months and of years was sadly broken in
upon. The squalid wretchedness of those who administered
to our wants made rebellious even our
hungry stomachs, and we spent our first night
of real disappointment on the great prairies, under
circumstances which we thought, before our sad
experience, would have afforded us all the substantial
food for body and mind that we could have
desired.