28 THE HOG. 



intended) was forbidden by the Mosaic laws as food ? Surely 

 the same objection could not apply to this latter animal as to the 

 hog. Whatever the motive might have been, both among the 

 Egyptians and the Jews, which led them to forbid the use of 

 swine's flesh on the table, a regard to the health of the people 

 was not one. Locusts were permitted by the latter, but creep- 

 ing things in general denied, as were also fishes destitute of ap- 

 parent scales. Among the ancient Greeks and Romans, the flesh 

 of the pig was held in great estimation. The art of rearing, 

 breeding, or fattening these animals, was made a complete stu- 

 dy ;and the dishes prepared from the meat were dressed with 

 epicurean refinement, and in many modes. One dish consisted 

 of a young pig whole, stuffed with beccaficoes and other small 

 birds, together with oysters, and served in wine and rich gravy. 

 This dish was termed Porcus Trojanus, in allusion to the wooden 

 horse, filled with men, which the Trojans introduced into their 

 city an unpleasant allusion, one would think, seeng that the 

 Romans boasted their Trojan descent. However, such was the 

 name of this celebrated and most expensive dish, so costly, indeed, 

 that sumptuary regulations were passed respecting it. 



Esteemed, however, as the flesh of the hog was by the Greeks 

 and Romans, commonly as the animal was kept, and carefully and 

 even curiously as it was fed, in order to gratify the appetites of the 

 wealthy and luxurious, yet the swineherd, as may be inferred from 

 the silence of the classic writers, and especially of the poets who 

 painted rural life, was not held in much estimation. No gods or 

 heroes are described as keeping swine. Theocritus never intro- 

 duces the swineherd into his idyls, nor does Virgil admit him into 

 his eclogues, among his tuneful shepherds. Homer indeed honors 

 Eumseus, the swineherd of Ulysses, with many commendations ; but 

 he is a remarkable exception. Perhaps a general feeling prevailed, 

 and still in some measure prevails, that the feeders of the gluttonous 

 and wallowing swine became assimilated in habits and manners to 

 the animals under their charge ; or, it may be, that the prejudices 

 of the Egyptians relative to this useful class of men, extended to 

 Greece or Italy, giving a bias to popular opinion. 



From the earliest times in our own island, the hog has been re- 

 garded as a very important animal, and vast herds were tended by 

 swineherds, who watched over their safety in the woods, and col- 

 lected them under shelter at night. Its flesh was the staple article 

 of consumption in every household, and much of the wealth of the 

 rich and free portion of the community consisted in these animals. 

 Hence bequests of swine, with land for their support, were often 

 made ; rights and privileges connected with their feeding, and the 

 extent of woodland to be occupied by a given number, were granted 

 according to established rules. In an ancient Saxon grant, quoted 



