tAP. XXIV.] FARMING FOR LADIES. 471 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



Qualities of bacon — Pigs and pig-sties — Prince Albert's 

 piggery — Food of a breeding sow — Age of bacon — Hogs — 

 Guimaraen hams — Rudgewick hogs — Ringing of pigs — 

 Fatting for bacon — Live and dead weight — Caging — 

 Killing and curing — Wiltshire and other modes — Hambro' 

 pickle — Smoking — Diseases of pigs. 



In regard to the flesh of the hog, and more 

 particularly to bacon, the fat differs from that 

 of every other animal, both in its quality and 

 in its mode of distribution over the body. 

 Thus it has been remarked by Buffon, " that 

 the fat of man, and of those animals which 

 have no suet — such, for instance, as the dog 

 and the horse — is pretty equally mixed with 

 the flesh ; while the suet of the sheep, the 

 goat, and deer, is found only at the extre- 

 mities of the flesh : but the fat of the hog 

 is neither mixed with the flesh nor collected 

 at its extremities, but covers the animal all 

 over, and forms a thick, distinct, and conti- 

 nued layer between the flesh and the skin." 

 The substance of the fat is also more dense 

 and transparent than that of other quadrupeds ; 

 nor is it soft and oily, like that of grease. 



