Timber, for the building of a Frigat, which I had left half finished at
Point Comfort, the 19. of March: and returned myself with the ship into
Pembrook [Potomac] River, and so discovered to the head of it, which is
about 65 leagues into the Land, and navigable for any ship. And then
marching into the Countrie, I found great store of Cattle as big as
Kine, of which the Indians that were my guides killed a couple, which we
found to be very good and wholesome meate, and are very easie to be
killed, in regard they are heavy, slow, and not so wild as other beasts
of the wildernesse."

[Note 3: Purchas: His Pilgrimes. (1625.) Vol. IV, p. 1765. "A letter of
Sir Samuel Argoll touching his Voyage to Virginia, and actions there.
Written to Master Nicholas Hawes, June, 1613."]

It is to be regretted that the narrative of the explorer affords no clew
to the precise locality of this interesting discovery, but since it is
doubtful that the mariner journeyed very far on foot from the head of
navigation of the Potomac, it seems highly probable that the first
American bison seen by Europeans, other than the Spaniards, was found
within 15 miles, or even less, of the capital of the United States, and
possibly within the District of Columbia itself.

The first meeting of the white man with the buffalo on the northern
boundary of that animal's habitat occurred in 1679, when Father
Hennepin ascended the St. Lawrence to the great lakes, and finally
penetrated the great wilderness as far as western Illinois.

The next meeting with the buffalo on the Atlantic slope was in October,
1729, by a party of surveyors under Col. William Byrd, who were engaged
in surveying the boundary between North Carolina and Virginia.