MY FRIEND THE PIG 297 



once more able to enjoy their salmon or turbot, 

 veal and lamb cutlets, fat capons, turkeys and 

 geese, sirloins of beef, and, finally, roast pig. 

 That's the limit ; we have outgrown cannibalism, 

 and are not keen about haggis, though it is still 

 eaten by the wild tribes inhabiting the northern 

 portion of our island. All this should serve to 

 teach vegetarians not to be in a hurry. Thoreau's 

 " handful of rice " is not sufficient for us, and not 

 good enough yet. It will take long years and 

 centuries of years before the wolf with blood on 

 his iron jaws can be changed into the white innocent 

 lamb that nourishes itself on grass. 



Let us now return to my friend the pig. He 

 inhabited a stye at the far end of the back garden 

 of a cottage or small farmhouse in a lonely little 

 village in the Wiltshire downs where I was staying. 

 Close to the stye was a gate opening into a long 

 green field, shut in by high hedges, where two or 

 three horses and four or five cows were usually 

 grazing. These beasts, not knowing my sentiments, 

 looked askance at me and moved away when I first 

 began to visit them, but when they made the 

 discovery that I generally had apples and lumps 

 of sugar in my coat pockets they all at once became 

 excessively friendly and followed me about, and 

 would put their heads in my way to be scratched, 

 and licked my hands with their rough tongues to 

 show that they liked me. Every time I visited the 

 cows and horses I had to pause beside the pig-pen 

 to open the gate into the field ; and invariably the 



