My friend George Bent--son of Col. William Bent, one of the historic characters of the early West--tells me that during a long course of trading among the Cheyennes and Arapahoes, he has seen but five robes that could fairly be called white. One of these was silver-gray, another, white, a third, cream color, the fourth, dapple gray, and the fifth, yellowish fawn color. He tells me that in ancient times the white buffalo was regarded by the Cheyennes as sacred, and that, if one of them killed a white buffalo, he left it where it fell, taking nothing from it, and not even putting a knife into it. The Cheyennes believe that any white buffalo belongs far to the north, and comes from that region where, according to their tradition, the buffalo originally came out of the ground.
A great many years ago a war party of Cheyennes went up north against the Crows. One day they came to a hill, and when they looked over it they saw before them great herds of buffalo lying down, and among them a cow, perfectly white. When the buffalo stood up to go to water, the white cow also stood up, and went with them, and it was observed that none of the other buffalo went very close to her. They did not appear to fear her, but they did not crowd close about her; they gave her plenty of room, as if they respected her. This led the Cheyennes to think that the white buffalo was a chief among other buffalo.
The women of the Cheyennes did not dress a white buffalo’s hide. When occasion arose for such work, it was commonly done by some captive woman; for example, a Kiowa, or a Pawnee,--some one who was not bound by Cheyenne customs and Cheyenne fears. Rarely, a Cheyenne woman went through a certain ceremony, being prayed over by a medicine-man, and painted in a peculiar fashion; this ceremony removed the tabu, and she might then dress the white robe.
The habits of the buffalo were in most respects those of domestic cattle. They fed in loose herds as cattle do, the members of a family--that is to say, the old cow and her progeny, sometimes up to three or four years old--keeping together; the old bulls, lazier, heavier, and less active than the cows and the younger stock, were usually on the outskirts of the herd, and if it was slowly moving in any direction, were likely to be behind. Much has been written concerning the intelligence of the buffalo, and the manner in which the bulls stood sentry over the herd, constantly on the watch for danger. There is not and never was any foundation for these stories, which were mere creations of the writer’s imagination. As a matter of fact, the cows were much more alert and watchful than the bulls, were always the first to detect danger and to move away from it, while the bulls were dull and slow, and often did not start to run until the herd at large was in full flight. Moreover, the cows and younger animals of the herd were much swifter than the bulls, and so pressed constantly to the front, while the bulls brought up the rear. The disposition of the males had nothing to do with any desire to protect the herd, but resulted from the fact that they were slower than the others. The earlier writers on the habits of these and other animals, credited them with human motives and aspirations, which of course they do not possess. A somewhat similar fashion of writing about animals is current at the present day, but is false and unnatural, and will pass.