THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN

by

ZANE GREY





PREFATORY NOTE

Buffalo Jones needs no introduction to American sportsmen, but to
these of my readers who are unacquainted with him a few words may
not be amiss.

He was born sixty-two years ago on the Illinois prairie, and he
has devoted practically all of his life to the pursuit of wild
animals. It has been a pursuit which owed its unflagging energy
and indomitable purpose to a singular passion, almost an
obsession, to capture alive, not to kill. He has caught and
broken the will of every well-known wild beast native to western
North America. Killing was repulsive to him. He even disliked the
sight of a sporting rifle, though for years necessity compelled
him to earn his livelihood by supplying the meat of buffalo to
the caravans crossing the plains. At last, seeing that the
extinction of the noble beasts was inevitable, he smashed his
rifle over a wagon wheel and vowed to save the species. For ten
years he labored, pursuing, capturing and taming buffalo, for
which the West gave him fame, and the name Preserver of the