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in searching for game, and in performing the other evolutions, 

 as to back and stand, equal to the most accomplished pointer, 

 besides many other sagacious feats ; and although the revela- 

 tions of history and science introduce him to us as a descend- 

 ant of most ancient ancestry, living cotemporaneously with the 

 extinct Mastodons and Elephants, and belonging by classifi- 

 cation to the intelligent group of animals called the Pachyder- 

 mata, he has nevertheless, from time immemorial, been the 

 object of a most unjust and inveterate prejudice. The Egyp- 

 tians and the Jews fulminated against him their legal thunder, 

 branded him as unclean, and pronounced his flesh unfit to be 

 eaten. The Mohamedans, following in the wake of the same 

 peculiar sentiments, thundered forth their anathamas against 

 pork. 



But while the ancient clefamers of the hog's good name 

 have been stripped of their glory and power — while Egypt 

 has been reduced to a mere grave yard of her ancient renown, 

 and the ruins of her former glory have become her national 

 tomb-stones — while the Jews have been scattered and peeled, 

 and become the subjects of an inveterate prejudice, such as 

 their fathers fastened upon the unoffending swine — while clouds 

 and darkness have settled around the home of the Mussulman 

 — the hog has perserveringly rooted on, in the line of his 

 humble vocation, and Providence, as a reward for the patient 

 fidelity with which he pursues his daily round of duties, has 

 gradually been rooting from the hearts of men the prejudice 

 that has so long existed against him. He has — unlike his 

 ancient defamers — steadily pursued the highway of progress ; 

 kept pace with the advance of civilization ; and has gradually 

 developed his physical attributes, until he has become the most 

 important of all the domestic animals, a favorite with the most 

 enlightened nations of the earth. 



In this he strikingly illustrates the truth, which is sometimes 

 biought to our notice in other departments of the divine econ- 

 omy, that modest merit though obscure in its position, and 

 called to struggle against the withering breath of slander and 



