Another way was to take advantage of the blind impetuosity of the charge of a herd and lead it over the brink of a precipice. A man holding upon himself a buffalo skin with head and horns, and running before the herd toward the precipice, thus induced the buffalo to follow, as they took him to be one of themselves. At the brink the man secured himself in some safe nook, while the herd, forced by the rush from behind, fell over the cliff and were dashed to death. The hunters then took what they wished and left the rest to the wolves. The fur companies about 1835, when the beaver began to fail and they found their next mainstay in buffalo robes, annually sent to market about a hundred thousand. Add to this a greater number killed by all parties for various purposes, and it is reasonable to estimate the number yearly destroyed at not less than a quarter of a million. When the value of robes fell off, the buffalo was killed for hides and tallow. Eventually the price of hides fell to no more than one dollar apiece, delivered in Leavenworth. Made into leather, the bison hides could not compare with those of domestic cattle. It was soft and spongy and not adapted for shoe, for sole, or for harness leather. Large quantities were at one time finished by American tanners, but were chiefly used for making horse collars. A good deal was exported to Great Britain. The process of tanning was the same as for ordinary leather. But no method of tanning robes with the hair on could equal that of the natives, and this was admitted by the best American tanners, who turned out few robes for this reason. The Amerind method was first to scrape off the superfluous flesh with a sort of bone adze, the skin being either stretched on a frame or pegged out on the ground. When dry the surface was rubbed and scraped again and then covered with the brains and rolled up flesh side in for three or four days, the brains of the animal being sufficient for its own hide. Then it was soaked in water and softened by working and rubbing, thoroughly smoked over a fire of rotten wood, and finally rubbed down to a finish. A large hide was often split in two for convenience in dressing and then sewed together after completion of the tanning process. One hardly thinks of Washington Irving as a sportsman and buffalo hunter, yet he was out on the plains in 1832 gaily charging after buffalo with pistols of the old priming-pan pattern, for breech-loaders were not yet in use, and many of the early trappers had only the old flint-lock. It was the breech-loading repeater and canned goods that finished the buffalo.