THE POINTS OF A GOOD PIG. 
527 
“ They have been observed,” says Mr. Darwin, “ to enter a tent, 
and actually pull some meat from beneath the head of a sleeping 
seaman. The Guachos, also, have frequently in the evening killed 
them, by holding out a piece of meat in one hand, and in the other 
a knife ready to stick them. As far as I am aware, there is no 
other instance in any part of the world of so small a mass of 
broken land, distant from a continent, possessing so large an abori- 
ginal quadruped peculiar to iself. Their numbers have rapidly de- 
creased ; they are already banished from that half of the island 
which lies to the eastward of the neck of land between St. Salva- 
dor Bay and Berkley Sound. Within a very few years after these 
islands shall have become regularly settled, in all probability this 
creature will be classed with the Dodo, as an animal which has 
perished from the face of the earth*.” 
[To be continued.] 
THE POINTS OF A GOOD PIG. 
[From “The Farmer’s Herald.”] 
I WOULD now desire to caution the reader against being led away 
by mere name in his selection of a pig. A pig may be called a 
Berkshire or a Suffolk, or any other breed most in estimation, and 
yet may, in reality, possess none of this valuable blood. The only 
sure mode by which the buyer will be able to avoid imposition is, 
to make name always secondary to points. If you find a pig 
possessed of such points of form as are calculated to ensure early 
maturity and facility of taking flesh, you need care little what it 
has seemed good to the seller to call him ; and remember that no 
name can bestow value upon an animal deficient in the qualities to 
which I have alluded. The true Berkshire — that possessing a 
dash of the Chinese and Neapolitan varieties — -comes, perhaps, 
nearer to the desired standard than any other. The chief points 
which characterise such a pig are the following : — In the first 
place, sufficient depth of carcass, and such an elongation of body as 
will ensure a sufficient lateral expansion. Let the loin and breast 
be broad. The breadth of the former denotes good room for the 
play of the lungs, and a consequent free and healthy circulation, 
essential to the thriving and fattening of any animal. The bones 
should be small, and the joints fine — nothing is more indicative of 
Journal of Researches, &c., p. 194. 
