OF SELBORNE 207 



horns, and hoarse voices when they low, like cows : for 

 bulls have short straight horns ; and though they mutter 

 and grumble in a deep tremendous tone, yet they low in 

 a shrill high key. Capons have small combs and gills, 

 and look pallid about the head, like pullets ; they also 

 walk without any parade, and hover chickens like hens. 

 Barrow-hogs have also small tusks like sows. 



Thus far it is plain that the deprivation of masculine 

 vigour puts a stop to the growth of those parts or appen- 

 dages that are looked upon as its insignia. But the 

 ingenious Mr. Lisle, in his book on husbandry, carries it 

 much farther ; for he says that the loss of those insignia 

 alone has sometimes a strange effect on the ability itself : 

 he had a boar so fierce and venereous, that, to prevent 

 mischief, orders were given for his tusks to be broken oiT. 

 No sooner had the beast suffered this injury than his 

 powers forsook him, and he neglected those females to 

 whom before he was passionately attached, and from 

 whom no fences could restrain him. 



LETTER XXXIII 



The natural term of an hog's life is little known, and 

 the reason is plain — because it is neither profitable nor 

 convenient to keep that turbulent animal to the full 

 extent of its time : however, my neighbour, a man of 

 substance, who had no occasion to study every little 

 advantage to a nicety, kept an half-bred Bantam sow, 

 who was as thick as she was long, and whose belly swept 

 on the ground, till she was advanced to her seventeenth 

 year ; at which period she showed some tokens of age by 

 the decay of her teeth and the decline of her fertility. 



