RUMINANTS. 449 



black to rusty-brown in colour when adult, and where it appears 

 on the Continent seems to revel in damp thickly vegetated areas, 

 hiding during the day and coming out at night to feed. The 

 food consists of roots of various kinds, corn, potatoes, acorns 

 and other nuts, and insects, worms, &c., in the soU, and even 

 voles. The wild boar when fully mature often attains the 

 length of seven feet from the snout to the tip of the tail. The 

 young are white marked with dark-brown. 



The habits of the domestic pigs are much the same as S. 

 scrofa : especially to be pointed out is the great benefit to be 

 derived from keeping them in orchards, where they do inestim- 

 able good in devouring noxious insects. 



RUMINANTS {=SELENODONTA). 



The Ruminants have two toes on each foot, each toe having 

 a separate hoof : there may also be two supplementary hoofs 

 at the back of the foot. If one examines the skeleton of the 

 ox, it will be observed that the two metacarpal and metatarsal 

 bones have joined to form the " cannon-bone." The tubercles of 

 the molars are transformed into longitudinally placed half-moons. 



The Ruminant Siomach. — The stomach (fig. 214) is peculiarly 

 constituted, consisting of four divisions — namely, (1) the rumen 

 or paunch ; (2) the reticulum or honeycomb stomach ; (3) the 

 manyplies, psalterium, or omasum; and (4) the abomasum or 

 rennet stomach. The paunch is where large quantities of 

 partly masticated vegetable food is stored. This is brought 

 back to the mouth, where it is mixed with saliva, chewed 

 up by the grinding teeth, and reduced to a fine pulp, the so- 

 called " chewing of the cud." This food then passes down the 

 gullet, and moves along a "gutter" called the "oesophageal 

 groove" into the omasum. The paunch equals nine -tenths 

 of the entire abdomen and lies in the left flank, the other three 

 divisions forming a chain along the front of its left side. In 

 the rumen the food is moistened. The reticulum is internally 



2 F 



