The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal Observations

On another tragic occasion a mink slaughtered an entire flock of fifteen gulls; but its joy of killing was short-lived, for it was quickly caught and clubbed to death. A miserable little weasel killed three fine brant geese, purely for the love of murder; and then he departed this life by the powder-and-lead route. All the year round captive buffalo bulls are given to fighting, and for one bull to injure or kill another is an occurrence all too common. Even in the great twenty-seven thousand acre reserve of the Corbin Blue Mountain Forest Association, fatal fights sometimes occur. It was left to a large bull named Black Beauty, in our Zoological Park herd, to reveal the disagreeable fact that under certain circumstances a buffalo may become a cunning and deliberate assassin. In the spring of 1904, a new buffalo bull, named Apache, was added to the portion of our herd which up to that time had been dominated by Black Beauty. We expected the usual head-to-head battle for supremacy, succeeded by a period of peace and quiet. It is the law of the herd that after every contest for supremacy the vanquished bull shall accept the situation philosophically, and thereafter keep his place. At the end of a half-hour of fierce struggle, head-to-head, Black Beauty was overpowered by Apache, and fled from him into the open range. To emphasize his victory, Apache followed him around and around at a quiet walk, for several hours; but the beaten bull always kept a factor of safety of about two hundred feet between himself and the master of the herd. Convinced that Black Beauty would no longer dispute his supremacy, Apache at last pronounced for peace and thought no more about the late unpleasantness. His rival seemed to accept the situation, and rejoined the herd on the subdued status of an ex-president.