LETTER XXXIII. 



T'o the same. 



HE natural term of an hog's life is little known, 

 and the reason is plain because it is neither pro- 

 fitable nor convenient to keep that turbulent animal 

 to the full extent of its time : however, my neigh- 

 bour, a man of substance, who had no occasion to 

 study every little advantage to a nicety, kept an 

 half-bred bantam-sow, who was as thick as she 

 was long, and whose belly swept on the ground, till she was advanced 

 to her seventeenth year, at which period she showed some tokens of 

 age by the decay of her teeth and the decline of her fertility. 



For about ten years this prolific mother produced two litters in 

 the year of about ten at a time, and once above twenty at a litter ; 

 but, as there were near double the number of pigs to that of teats 



