REPORT ON SWINE. 15 



pursue such a wise system in their care and management as 

 shall make this department of their farming pay. It can be 

 done ; and our farmers owe it to themselves that they do this, 

 or cease to keep that which so many now declare to be so 

 unprofitable. Such farmers, however, should blush to own 

 themselves beaten by the humble Irish cottager, who, with 

 few if any of the natural resources such as are incidental to 

 a well-managed farm and dairy, finds it highly profitable to 

 keep one or more " gintlemin," that, if necessary, goes to pay 

 the "• riiit," or to furnish himself and family with their year's 

 stock of meat. 



SELECTION OF BEEED. 



No small amount of the profits in feeding pigs will depend 

 upon the breed : therefore, in selecting the hog best adapted 

 to the wants of the New-England farmer, an animal neither 

 too large and coarse, nor one too small, should be chosen. 

 While in some sections a black hog is all the rage, the color 

 being no objection, in others it is looked upon with such 

 dislike, that, however excellent the breed or the animal, it is 

 condemned. Therefore, the farmer who intends to breed pure 

 bloods to sell for breeding purposes, or expects his neighbors 

 to use his thorough-bred sires to cross on common sows, will 

 do well to consult the taste of the farmers of the locality in 

 which he lives. 



With the great advantage to be secured by the use of the 

 best improved breeds, which skilful and money-making 

 farmers have not been slow to discover, it is unaccountably 

 strange that there should be a class of farmers so blind to 

 their own interests as to continue to keep and breed the 

 " Racer " or " Landpike " breed in nearly its original purity. 

 These original subsoilers are never quiet, — either squealing, 

 rooting, or tearing their pens to pieces all the time. No 

 wonder their unfortunate owners bewail the hard times, and 

 speak the truth when they say that their hogs are a dead 

 loss to them, eating themselves and their owners out of house 

 and home. Why such stock is kept from becoming extinct 

 is because there exists a class of farmers so unwise, that 

 they think it is just as well to breed from a boar, the service 

 of which they usually get for nothing, as to patronize the 

 use of a good thorough-bred, for which one or two dollars is 

 charged. 



