Buffaloes were extremely important for the Indian tribes. They relied on hunting buffaloes to have enough food, to have clothes and also to have materials to build their homes. The Americans did everything they could to kill the buffaloes and in the 1890s, they hunted the buffaloes in the Texas region to extinction. The reason why they did it is because they hoped that by killing the buffaloes, the Indians will not be tempted to reclaim their hunting rights and to go and live as tribes once more. The death of the buffaloes is thus used here as a metaphor to suggest the death of the Indian tribes and to suggest the way the Americans tried to kill the American tribes by destroying their food supply.