60 THE HOG. 



hunters close around him, and a mortal combat ensues, in which the 

 beast eventually falls a victim. 



In treatises on venery and hunting, the technical term for the boar 

 in the first year is "a pig of the sounder ;" in the second, " a hog ;" 

 in the third, " a hog steer ;" and in the fourth, " a boar." 



Many of the forests in our own country were infested by wild 

 boars. The Anglo-Saxons seem, from the rude frescoes and prints 

 which are handed down to us, to have hunted this animal on 

 foot with no other weapon but the boar-spear, and attended by 

 powerful dogs ; and apparently with such success, that at the Nor- 

 man conquest William the First thought it necessary to make some 

 strict laws for the preservation of this beast of the chase. The 

 period for hunting the wild boar among the Anglo-Saxons was in 

 September. Howel Dha, the celebrated Welsh lawgiver, gave per- 

 mission to his chief huntsman to chase the boar from the middle of 

 November until the end of December. 



These animals continued to linger in the forests of England and 

 Scotland for several centuries after the Norman conquest, and many 

 tracts of land have derived their name from this occurrence, while 

 instances of valor in their destruction are recorded in the heraldic 

 devices of many a noble family. Fitzstephen, a writer of the 

 twelfth century, informs us that wild boars, stags, fallow-deer, and 

 bulls, abounded in the vast forests which existed on the northern 

 side of London in the time of Henry II. The learned Whittaker 

 informs us that this animal roved at liberty over the woods of the 

 parish of Manchester for many centuries after the Romans departed 

 from that station, and hence the name of Barlow (6oar-ground) came 

 to be assigned to a district in the south-western portion. In Cum- 

 berland, the appellation " Wild Boar's Fell," still points out the 

 haunts of this animal. The forests of Bernwood in Buckingham- 

 shire, of Stainmore in Westmoreland, and those extensive woody 

 districts which once existed in Hertfordshire and over the Chiltern 

 Hills, were formerly peopled with wild boars, wolves, stags, and 

 wild bulls. Many ancient Scottish writers, too, speak of the exist- 

 ence of this animal in the woods of Caledonia. In the county of 

 Fife there exists a tract of country formerly called Muckross (which 

 in the Celtic signifies Boar's Promontory) ; it is said to have been 

 famous as the haunt of wild boars. One part of it was called the 

 Boar Hills, which name has since been corrupted into Byro Hills. 

 It lies in the vicinity of St. Andrew's, and in the cathedral church 

 of that city two enormous boar's tusks were formerly to be seen 

 chained to the high altar, in commemoration of an immense brute 

 slain by the inhabitants after it had long ravaged the surrounding 

 country. 



The precise period at which the vild boar became exterminated in 

 England and Scotland cannot be correctly ascertained. Master John 



