202 SPECIES AND VARIETIES. 



The SPECIES are Asiatic, African, and European, 

 with which, perhaps, may be included the Ameri- 

 can PECCARY. The orifice on the loins of the 

 American Peccary, is an outlet for the secretion 

 of a gland which smells powerfully, not the navel 

 of the animal (as erroneously stated by some writers) ; 

 its probable use is to enable the sexes to find each 

 other in the large woods of the country which the 

 Peccaries inhabit. The navel will be found in the 

 usual situation. The ./Ethiopian swine is large in 

 a wild state, and has wattles under the eyes. The 

 VARIETIES produced in this country have generally 

 originated in crosses with our indigenous breed, 

 from the three grand specific divisions above cited ; 

 chiefly from the CHINESE, the black AFRICAN, the 

 SPANISH and PORTUGUESE, of nearly the same colour, 

 all more or less bare of hair; the red, or more 

 properly yellow ITALIAN, and the WILD SWINE of 

 the neighbouring continent. The motive for these 

 foreign crosses has been to abate and reduce the 

 redundant size and bone of our native stock, and 

 to substitute superior delicacy of flesh and aptitude 

 to fatten ; both which views have succeeded, the 

 latter, in the judgment of the author above quoted, 

 in an ordinate degree. Another motive has been 

 the extreme prolific quality of the southern and 

 wild breeds. 



