350 PIGS 



its hairs tinged with grey at the extremities as old age crept 

 over it." The shade is darker in hot than in temperate 

 climates, and even the pigs which have broken loose from 

 domestication become more russety or slate-coloured in 

 the tropics than in temperate climates. In the Argentine 

 the Camp Pig, not descended from modern imported blood, 

 has a dark or black skin, except under the belly, even 

 although (as in Plate LXXVIIL), the greater part of the body 

 is covered with strong white hair. The Wild Boar is an 

 extremely active and, when roused, dangerous animal. It is 

 not long since specimens of it were preserved in some of the 

 enclosed parks of the country. Wild pigs in Chartley Park 

 were so nimble that they hunted rabbits as successfully as an 

 English terrier dog. 



Improved pigs in this country are usually divided into 

 three classes black, white, and red or chocolate. The 

 great divergence in colour in stock of one descent was no 

 doubt due to the results of an inherent tendency to changes 

 aided at first by the influence of environment, and in recent 

 times by the artificial selection of breeders following their 

 fancy, fashion, or so-called work of improvement. The 

 modern Berkshire is a striking illustration of a breed being 

 fundamentally changed in colour in less than a human 

 generation. 



The whites prevail in Scotland and the north of 

 England ; the blacks in southern England. Between the 

 two, in central England and Wales, are to be found the 

 russet colours and combinations of the three colours, the 

 result of crossing. All have been improved by crossing 

 the native scrofa pigs with specimens of imported indicns 

 (which is not, however, so prolific), and by selection. The 

 Berkshire and Essex breeds, for instance, were improved 

 before the middle of the eighteenth century by the use of a 

 number of imported pigs belonging to an Italian breed, the 

 Neapolitan a black breed which had been dashed with 

 indicus blood. 



Improved breeds possess a much greater tendency to 

 fatten, and they have more symmetrical forms ; but they are 

 not so active and hardy in constitution as the older kinds. 



Porcine interests in Great Britain and Ireland are mainly 

 under the fostering care of the following Pig 1 Societies : 



