484 FEEDING ANIMALS. 



for any purpose. Ventilation is made so complete, that 

 fresh air is constantly admitted and vitiated air carried off. 

 This engine furnishes power for every purpose required ; 

 and when the cost is divided by the number of hogs fed, it is 

 so trivial as hardly to be worth considering. It is intended 

 that 200 hogs shall be constantly fattening, and their 

 places supplied by others as fast as sold. Hog-feeding may 

 thus be reduced to a system as perfect as that of cotton- 

 spinning. 



No STORING PERIOD. 



We have treated, in a general way, of all its various 

 stages of growth to the time of the final fattening period ; 

 and it has been plain, from our illustrations, that we believe 

 in a growing period commencing with the first day of its 

 life, and continuing till the last, and that there should be 

 no stand-still period in any correct system of feeding. But 

 the winter-storing system has taken such a deep root in the 

 minds of pig-raisers that Dr. Andrew McFarland, a former 

 superintendent of the Insane Asylum at Jacksonville, 111., 

 conceived the idea of placing the pig in compulsory hiber- 

 nation in winter, so as to have him ready for rapid growth 

 the following summer. This, he thinks, a most important 

 object to secure ; and if the storing system is necessary, we 

 cannot dispute his conclusion. He cites the case of a fat 

 hog that was accidentally buried under a straw-stack, in the 

 fall, where it remained several months, and on discovery, 

 came out alive and apparently well, having lost little flesh ; 

 and another case of a hog, buried under a snow-drift, re- 

 maining some eleven weeks, coming out alive, though gaunt 

 and lean, having lost its fat in keeping up animal heat. 

 From these and other instances, he supposes it quite possi- 

 ble to devise a system of hibernating the pig much cheaper 

 than feeding it. He would " select a dry spot, and place 

 a young hog, in good flesh, under an inverted box, contain- 

 ing 80 to 100 cubic feet of free air the box to be perfo- 



