ADVICE FOR LACKLAND 



might be virtue in the recommendation. But 

 a pig's work among your turfs is worth half 

 of his pork. He will thrive very likely upon 

 the waste from your table and your garden. 

 But, against any possible shortness of food 

 supply, it were well to provide a bag of what 

 the grain people will sell you as 'ship stuff;' 

 and this, stirred into the kitchen wash, will 

 make an unctuous holiday gruel for your little 

 beast, for which he will be clamorously 

 grateful. 



"Again ; the sty should be convenient to the 

 garden (a hemlock spruce or two will shut 

 off the sight of it, and a sweet honey-suckle 

 subdue the odors of it) ; then you may throw 

 over chance bits of purslane, or the suckers 

 from your sweet corn, or a gone-by salad, and 

 find thanks in the noisy smacking of his 

 chops. I would not give a fig for a country 

 house where no such homely addenda are 

 allowed, and where a starched air of propriety 

 must always reign, to the complete exclusion 

 of every stray weed, and to the exclusion of 

 the rollicking Suffolk grunter in its corner, 

 who squeals his entreaty, and declares thanks 

 with the click-clack of his active jaws. 



"He will take on larger and clumsier pro- 

 portions month by month, and will be none the 



73 



