THE HOG. 411 



ber of teeth, regarded as the most constant of characters in 

 the discrimination of species, and constantly employed in 

 classification, varies with the external agents which affect 

 the animals. In the wild state, the Hog has six incisor 

 teeth in the upper, and six in the lower jaw ; but, under the 

 effects of domestication, the number is reduced to three in 

 each jaw, and this number is not constant. The vertebrae of 

 the back vary from fourteen to fifteen in number, the lumbar 

 from four or five to six, the sacral from four to six, the caudal 

 from twenty-three to three or four, the tail being often rudi- 

 mental in the domesticated races. 



From the earliest times the Hog has been subjected to 

 domestication ; and his flesh has furnished food to the inhabi- 

 tants of Europe, and other regions of the Old Continents, 

 beyond all the records of tradition and history. By most of 

 the ancient nations his flesh was in great estimation, but by 

 others it was held in the utmost abhorrence. The Egyptians 

 not only abstained from the flesh of the Hog, but regarded 

 the very touch of the living animals as pollution, and the 

 persons employed in tending them as degraded outcasts. 

 The same feeling was entertained by the Hindoos, from 

 whom the Egyptians appear to have derived a part of their 

 arts and religious observances. 



In the marvellous Commonwealth of Moses, a like absti- 

 nence from the flesh of the Hog was enjoined upon all the 

 people of Israel. The Levitical code upon this subject is 

 precise : and in the precepts, warnings, and threatenings of 

 the Prophets, the use of swine's flesh is denounced as a 

 breach of the law, and an abomination in the sight of God. 

 The Jews were not even permitted to offer this detested 

 creature as a victim of the sacrifice, as the Egyptians were 

 allowed to do. and as the Greeks, Romans, and other people 

 practised. The sacrifice of the Hog is declared to be an 

 abomination to the Lord, and is compared in the degree of 

 guilt with the killing of a human victim, or the immolation 

 of a dog. To precepts so clear, and denunciations so ter- 



