“I remember what it means, but not the name,” up Happy Squirrel. “It means .”
“It is Un—Un-Ungu—” began Peter Rabbit and then stopped. For the life of him he couldn't think of the rest.
“Ungulata,” Old Mother Nature finished for him. “And Happy Jack has the meaning right. It is the order to which all hoofed animals belong. There are several families in the order, one of which you already have learned about—the Deer family. Now comes the family of Cattle and Sheep. It is called the Bovidae family, and the biggest and most important member is Thunderfoot the Bison, commonly called .
“Thunderfoot is more closely related to , Farmer Brown's Cow, than are the members of the Deer family, for he has true horns, not antlers. These are hollow and are not dropped each year, but are carried through life. Mrs. Thunderfoot has them also. The horns grow out from the sides of the forehead and then curve upward and inward, and are smooth and sharp. They are never branched.
“Thunderfoot is a great, heavy fellow the size of Farmer Brown's Ox, and has a great hump on his shoulders. He carries his head low and from his throat hangs a great beard. His head is large and is so covered with thick, curly hair that it appears much larger than it really is. His tail is rather short and ends in a of hair. The hair on his body and quarters is short and light brown, but on his shoulders and neck and his legs to the knees it is long and shaggy, dark brown above and almost black below.”
“He must be a queer looking fellow,” spoke up Chatterer the Red Squirrel.
“He is,” replied Old Mother Nature. “The front half of him looks so much bigger than the rear half that it almost seems as if they didn't belong together.”
“What does he eat?” asked Jumper the Hare.
“Grass,” replied Old Mother Nature . “He grazes just as does Bossy. When the weather becomes hot his thick coat, although much of it has been shed, becomes most uncomfortable. Also he is by flies. Then he delights in rolling in mud until he is plastered with it from head to feet.
“Many years ago there were more Bison than any other large animal in this country, and they were found in nearly all parts of it. Some lived in the woods and were called Wood , but the greatest number lived on the great plains and prairies, where the grass was . I have told you about the great of Barren Ground , but this is nothing to the great of Bison that used to move north or south, according to the season, across the great prairies. In the fall they moved south. In the spring they moved north, following the new grass as it appeared. When they , the noise of their feet was like thunder.
“But the hunters with terrible guns came and killed them for their skins, killed them by hundreds of thousands, and in just a few years those great herds became only a memory. Thunderfoot, once Lord of the Prairies, was driven out of all his great kingdom, and the Bison, from being the most numerous of all large animals, is to-day reduced to just a few hundreds, and most of these are kept in parks by man. Barely in time did man make laws to protect Thunderfoot. Without this protection he would not exist to-day.
“A close neighbor of Thunderfoot's in the days when he was Lord of the Prairies was Fleetfoot the . Fleetfoot is about the size of a small Deer, and in his appearance reminds one of Lightfoot, for he has the same trim body and long slim legs. He is built for speed and looks it. From just a glance at him you would know him for a runner just as surely as a look at Jumper the Hare would tell you that he must travel in great bounds. The truth is, Fleetfoot is the fastest runner among all my children in this country. Not one can keep up with him in a race.
“Fleetfoot's coat is a light yellowish-brown on the back and white . His forehead is brown and the sides of his face white. His throat and under side of his neck are white, crossed by two bands of brown. His , horns and eyes are black, and there is a black spot under each ear. Near the end of his nose he is also black, and down the back of his neck is a black line of stiff longer hairs. A large white patch surrounds his short tail. Who remembers what I told you about Antelope Jack, the big Jack Hare of the Southwest?”
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