210 THE HOG. 



and the meals should be given frequently, but only in moderation at 

 each time, over-gorging is sure to cause indigestion, and the only 

 remedy for this is abstinence ; a little sulphur occasionally mingled 

 with their food is useful. When the store hogs are first put up (and 

 \ve must suppose them in moderate condition), the food should only 

 be a few degrees superior to that on which they have already fed ; 

 it should be improved step by step, till the digestive powers are 

 adapted for that of the most nutritious quality ; and with this the 

 fattening must be completed. 



"A bacon-hog is generally fattened in autumn, and killed about 

 Christmas, sometimes after Christmas, sometimes a few weeks 

 before. The average length of time required for bringing the animal 

 into good condition, varies from about fourteen to twenty-one weeks, 

 according to size and breed. Some fatten hogs until they are inca- 

 pable of moving, from the enormous load of fat with which they are 

 burthened, and in order to accomplish this, four, five, or even six 

 months are required. An animal so fed will certainly not pay for 

 its food, nor can it be deemed in health ; the heart and lungs will be 

 oppressed, the circulation impeded, and the breathing laborious ; 

 sufficient fatness is all that is desirable. A fat hog is a comely, 

 comfortable-looking animal, the embodied type of epicurean felicity ; 

 but a bloated, overladen hog is a disgusting object, uneasy and dis- 

 tressed in its own feelings, incapable even of enjoying its food, buried 

 in its excessive fat. 



"The quantity of barley-meal, pea-meal, or other farinaceous 

 food (exclusive of wash, skim-milk, &c.) consumed by a hog during 

 the time of its fattening for bacon, will vary greatly according to 

 the size and breed of the animal. Taking the average, and supposing 

 the pig's age to be fourteen or fifteen months, and the animal to be in 

 fair condition, we should say that ten or twelve bushels of meal (that 

 is, barley-meal, pea-meal, &c.) would be sufficient for every useful 

 purpose ; well do we know that much less often suffices. But we 

 are supposing the production of first-rate bacon. Porkers, of course, 

 require a less outlay according to their age. A porker ought not to 

 carry too much fat; neither the feeder nor the buyer profit by over- 

 fed pork, though perhaps the pork-butcher may he retails it per 

 pound to his customers. Our observations, however, do not apply 

 to the respectable dealers in pork in London and its environs, who 

 exhibit the most delicious country-fed meat, and justly pride them- 

 selves upon an article of consumption which brings them the first- 

 rate custom. 



" With respect to the estimated tables relative to the increase in 

 weight of hogs, under certain modes of feeding, and under given 

 quantities of food, we hold them to be utterly fallacious. The feed- 

 er's means, the produce of his grounds, the breed he adopts, and the 

 proportion of a tention he bestows on the porcine part of his stock, 



