CHAPTER ALX 
THE PIG AND HIPPOPOTAMUS 
THE PIG TRIBE 
BY H, A. BRYDEN 
ANY species and varieties of swine are found in different parts of the world, most of 
them exhibiting strong traces of a general family resemblance, although widely 
sundered as to habitats and often markedly differing in outward appearance. All are 
omnivorous; all have the stomach simpler in type than in the Ruminants; and all have front 
or incisor teeth in the upper jaw. The two great families of swine proper are the Pigs and 
Peccaries. : 
There has been much discussion among scientists as to the early origin of the various 
breeds of domestic swine found in different parts of the world. There can be little doubt 
that, although selective breeding has produced extraordinary differences in outward appearance, 
even among the domestic pigs of our own islands, the origin of the numerous tame races is 
to be sought in the ancestry of the wild breeds of the countries in which they are found. 
Darwin has some very apposite remarks on the differences to be observed in domesticated 
swine. ‘The peculiar form of the skull and body in the most highly cultivated races is,” 
he observes, ‘not characteristic of any one race, but is common to all when improved up to 
Photo by W’, Reid 
A DOMESTICATED SOW AND HER PROGENY 
The absence of stripes and spots on the young is a feature in which they differ from those of nearly all wild swine 
274 
