198 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



One hardly thinks of pigs as possible pets ; yet those 



who have brought them up and acted the part of 



foster-mother, agree that they make charm- 



PA^Q c\^ 



Pigs m P ets > energetic and entertaining. They 

 soon know the step of their master, and 

 rush furiously to greet him with every sign of 

 delight. If properly kept no pet could be more cleanly 

 in habit. 



We know a village pig-butcher who, by the irony 

 of fate, made a pet of two little pigs, and was very 

 proud of his black and white twins, as he called them. 

 He reared them by hand, and nothing could be more 

 entertaining than their way of taking their meals of 

 milk and water ; they had been trained to rest their 

 front trotters on a box, with the idea of saving their 

 foster-parent's garments, and would greet the sight 

 of their bottle with joyous grunts. These piglets, at 

 weaning-time, had cost their master in food the sum of 

 7s. 9d. Had he cared to sell them they would have 

 brought him in about 4 each ; or supposing he were 

 to kill them himself and convert them into bacon, his 

 bacon would cost him about 3^d. a pound. That 

 this was his intention we gathered from his remark : 

 " I'll see as I don't pay no more 'levenpences a pound 

 for bacon." The pigs in the first place had cost him 

 nothing ; they were the " darls " or last -born pigs 

 of their litters, which are generally inferior to their 

 numerous brothers and sisters, and are often given 

 away. Clearly a darl may make a profitable pet. 



