THE HOG. 
217 
fourteen pounds for seventeen or eighteen pounds of ground seed. 
Neither should be given, except in combination with a large proportion 
of other substances, as they are of a very greasy nature, and are apt to 
impart a rank flavor to flesh, if given in an unmixed state, and are 
actually more efficacious in combination. If you have plenty of meal, 
the addition of a little to the daily feeds will be found to tell well, espe- 
cially toward the close of fattening, a few weeks previous to transferring 
your stock to the butcher. 
The refuse of mills forms a very valuable item in swine food, when 
mixed with such boiled roots as I have enumerated — as starch sounds, 
the refuse from the manufacture of that article; also the fibrous refuse 
remaining from the manufacture of potato-starch. 
Swine are frequently kept by butchers, and are fed principally upon 
the garbage of the shambles — as entrails, the paunches, lights, and the 
viscera of sheep and cattle, as well as the blood. Swine are, like their 
human owners, omnivorous, and few articles come amiss to them. It 
must, nevertheless, be confessed, that the flesh of hogs fed on animal 
food is rank both in smell and taste, and readily distinguishable from 
that produced from a vegetable diet. I am not unnecessarily prejudiced, 
and it is on the merits of the case alone that I condemn butcher-fed 
pork. Pork butchers, resident in large towns, are very apt to feed 
chiefly on offal of all sorts, including that arising from the hogs daily 
slain and dressed for the market. 
There is yet another description of feeding — I allude to the feeding 
of swine in knackers’ yards. The animals are kept in considerable num- 
bers, and are fed wholly upon the refuse of dead horses — chiefly the 
entrails, the carcass being in too great demand among those who keep 
dogs to permit of it being unnecessarily wasted. Nor are these horses 
always fresh, the swine reveling in corruption, and disputing with the 
maggot the possession of a mass of liquid putrefaction. And are we to 
say nothing of the number of horses who die of glanders, farcy, or some 
similarly frightful contagious and incurable disorder? How can we be 
certain that this is not one of the many sources whence occasionally 
spring apparently causeless pestilences or malignant epidemics? While 
such a practice is tolerated, with what caution should we not purchase 
bacon or pork, lest we should thus eat at second-hand of substances so 
revolting to the feelings, so dangerous to individual and public health ! 
Chandlers’ Greaves are likewise objectionable as food for swine, unless 
given in comparatively small quantities, and mixed with bran, meal, and 
boiled roots. If fed wholly on either greaves, or oil-cake, or flax-seed, 
the flesh becomes loose, unsubstantial, and carriony ; and gives out a 
flavor resembling that of rancid oil. 
Ilogs that have been fed chiefly on corn, alternated with the vegetable 
diet already described, produce r>ork nearly equal in delicacy of flavor, 
whiteness of color, and consequent value, to that well-known, delicious 
article, dairy pork. Indian corn is most useful in feeding and in fatten- 
ing pigs ; it should be employed in conjunction with oat or barley meal, 
or some other equally nutritious matter. 
Respecting the quality of food, vast numbers of bacon hogs are almost 
invariably fed upon potatoes; but however apparently satisfactory may 
