THE PREHISTORIC FARMYARD 249 



must be honoured before the disciple of Confucius 

 who is credited with having discovered, merely by 

 accident, their merits when roasted. We can quite 

 understand how the resolve arose. What could be 

 more natural to the tribesman, or the village, who 

 already possessed a small and increasing herd of dairy 

 animals reclaimed from the forest, than to follow this 

 up by catching, either in nets or pitfalls, a family of 

 young wild swine and adding them to their farm 

 stock ? Their prolific character must have been well 

 known, and as Mahomet promised a blessing and 

 angels' visits to the home which possessed three goats, 

 so the neighbours must have looked with envy on the 

 recurrent families of wild piglings in the wicker-fenced 

 enclosures of the more adventurous. It is possible, 

 even at this distant date, to trace under the artificially 

 rounded form of the Tamworth breed the long, sus- 

 picious nose, the rufous bristles, and the thoughtful 

 eye of its original wild ancestor. 



If the East troubled not with the pig, it probably gave 

 to the world its flocks of sheep and goats. Asia is the 

 true home of the domesticated goat. It is there that it 

 flourishes and is held in honour. There, too, lives the 

 animal which by general consent is the original of the 

 common domestic breed, the wild Paseng-goat, or ibex, 

 call it which you please, of Asia Minor and Persia. 

 There would not be the slightest difficulty in domesti- 

 cating the young of several species of mountain sheep 

 to-day, if this were desired. Difficult as the lambs are to 

 catch, they are taken when very young on the mountains, 

 and the only difference in their behaviour is that though 



