1016 PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. Part III. 



6535. Tame hogs are qften very troublesome in cultivated grounds, ploughing them up with their 

 gnouts, and thus entirely frustrating the labors of the agriculturist. Worms, the wild carrot, and other 

 roots, are the objects of their search. The wild boar having a longer and stronger snout than the do- 

 mestic variety, digs deejjer, and continues his furrow nearly in a straight line. The inhabitants of America 

 find the hog very beneficial in clearing their lands of rattlesnakes and other serpents, upon which he 

 congtantly preys, without apparently suffering any injury. 



6536. The hog is, in a very considerable degree, beneficial to mankind. His flesh is pleasant, substantial, 

 and nutritious. It affords numberless materials for the table of the epicure ; among these is brawn, 

 which seems peculiar to England. Pork takes salt better than the flesh of any animal, and is, in con- 

 sequence, preserved longer, and always makes an important article in naval stores. The lard of the hog 

 is essential to the cook and confectioner ; it is used in various medical preparations, and is compounded 

 by the perfumer into pomatums. The bristles are made into brushes, and are, moreover, of great use to 

 the shoemaker. The skin is worked into coverings for pocket-books, and other articles. 



6537. The hog in British farming is in general viewed as a subordinate species of 

 live stock, and chiefly valuable as consuming what would otherwise be lost. There 

 are, however, swine husbandmen who keep large herds to advantage, especially millers, 

 brewers, distillers, and dairymen, to whom they are an object of importance ; and return, 

 for the offal they consume, a greater weight of meat, according to some double the 

 weight, than could be obtained from cattle. In those parts where potatoes are raised 

 as a fallow crop, much beyond the demand for them as human food ; as is the case in 

 particular in Ireland, and the west of Scotland, the rearing and feeding of swine, 

 the most of them sent to a distance in the state of bacon and pickled pork, is a branch 

 of management on which great dependence is placed for the payment of their rents 

 and other charges. The prolific nature of this animal, however, rendering it so easy 

 to increase the supply beyond the demand, the price of swine flesh varies more than 

 that of any other sort of butcher's meat, and their culture can never be so much de- 

 pended on by the general farmer as that of cattle or sheep. A writer in the 

 Farmer s Magazine observes, that the swine are the only variety of granivorous animals 

 that can be fed upon the offal of grain, or such articles as would otherwise go to waste 

 about a farm-steading. Since the erection of threshing machines, a much greater 

 quantity of light grain is beat from the straw, than was gained when the flail was 

 employed. To use this extra quantity to advantage becomes an important concern 

 to the occupiers of land ; and this writer thinks that the using of it in raising and sup- 

 porting swine is by far the most profitable mode of consuming an article, which, in 

 other respects, is comparatively of little value. 



Sect. I. Of the Varieties of the common Hog. 



6538. The domesticated European variety o( thQ common hog (fg. 685.) is too well 



685 known to require any de- 686 



scription. 



6539. The Chinese hog 

 (fig. 686.) is distinguished 

 from the common, by having 

 the upper part of its body 

 almost bare, its belly hang- 

 ing nearly to the ground; 

 ' ^ its legs are very short, and 

 its tail still more disproportionately short. The flesh of this variety is' whiter and 

 more delicate. The color is commonly a dark grey. It abounds in China, and is dif- 

 fused through New Guinea, and many islands in the South Sea. The New Hebrides, 

 the Marquesas, the Friendly and the Society Islands, possess this animal, an., cultivate it 

 with great care, as it is almost the only domestic animal of which they can boast. The 

 varieties of hog cultivated in Britain, are partly the result of climate and keep in the 

 European variety, and partly the effects of crossing with the Chinese. At the same 

 time, it is only in particular districts that so much attention has been paid to this animal, 

 as to give rise to any accurate distinction of breeds ; and nowhere has it received any 

 considerable portion of that care in breeding, which has been so advantageously employed 

 on the other animals of which we have treated. Yet, among none of the varieties of 

 those is there so great a difference as among the breeds of this species, in regard to the 

 meat they return for the consumption of a given quantity of food. Some races can with 

 difficulty be made fat, even at an advanced age, though fed from the trough with 

 abundance of such food as would fatten any other animal ; while others contrive to 

 raise a valuable carcase out of materials on which no other creature could subsist. 



6540. The Chinese race, according to Culley, has been subdivided into seven varieties or more; and it 

 would be easy to point out twice the number of as prominent distinctions among the sorts in the third 

 class. But such an affectation of accuracy is as useless as it would be tedious. One general form, ap- 

 proaching to that of other animals kept for their carcase, ought certainly to be preferred ; and the size, 

 which is the other distinguishing characteristic, must be chosen with a view to the food provided for their 

 maintenance, and not because it is possible to raise the individuals to a great, and probably, unprofitable 

 weight The fineness of the bone, and the broad, though also deep, form of the chest, denote in this, as 

 Ui the other species, a disposition to make fat with a moderate consumption of food; and, while it may 

 be advisable to prefer the larger breeds in those places where bacon and flitches are in most demand, the 



