1947. 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
277 
motion, is most extraordinary. These mills are not only 
employed in pumping water and grinding grain, but in 
producing stones for cement, expressing oil from seeds, 
grinding paints for colors, &c., &c. 
Soon after escaping from among the windmills, we 
came upon the border of a large polder called the 
Wurmur. Polder is the Dutch name for a piece of 
reclaimed land, occupying the place of a former lake. 
The first step in making a polder, is to surround the 
lake with a broad double dyke or canal, with very firm 
embankments; this canal discharges the water at the 
nearest practicable point, and also serves to convey 
the produce of the polder to a market. When it is 
complete, they erect one or more windmills, according 
to the size of the polder, and commence pumping. 
The Archimedean screw, is, I believe, almost univer¬ 
sally employed at present. When the water is sunk 
to such a level that the*first mill can no longer reach 
it, a second is placed, and a small canal formed, con¬ 
veying the water which it raises, to the first. In this 
way, the water in some very deep polders is lifted four 
or five times. When the bed of the lake is laid, dry 
roads are run across it, at right angles to each other, 
and square farms, divided up by ditches, are laid out. 
There are large central ditches which convey the wa¬ 
ter to the spot where it is to be purpped up by the 
windmills, and from some low parts the water is dis¬ 
charged into these by small auxiliary mills, there being 
thus a polder within a polder. In the summer, the 
mills have ordinarily not much work to do, but in the 
spring and autumn they are often taxed to their full 
power. In large draining operations now going on, 
such as the Haarlemer Meer, they are employing steam 
to do the pumping, instead of wind, as being more to 
be depended upon, and also more economical. 
When the bed of the lake is thus laid dry, the next 
step is to lay it out in farms. These are rather large 
ordinarily, and are square except where they reach to 
the outer edge of the dyke. One or two large high¬ 
ways run through the middle, and at the corner of 
each farm stands a farm-house, in most respects re¬ 
sembling its neighbors. Nearly all are square, and 
built of bricks, with low whitewashed walls, not 
more than six or eight feet in height, and without 
windows; some little holes admit a glimmering of 
light, but it must be very faint. I believe that this 
portion of the house is used for the sleeping rooms of 
servants, and as a granary. The lower parts of these 
houses are sometimes painted with a stripe of black 
and then of white, and the trees ornamented to the 
same height with the same colors. 
Every farm is surrounded by its ditch, and often has 
two or three running through its centre. There are 
no fences, but gates at the bridges keep the cattle con¬ 
fined within their proper fields. 
An account of the remainder of this excursion I must 
defer until another opportunity. 
John P. Norton. 
YOUATT’S WORK ON THE PIG. 
We gave a brief notice of this work last month, but 
had not then space for any portion of its contents. The 
author begins by giving, the natural history of the pig. 
next shows the origin of our domestic races, with use¬ 
ful and interesting observations on their respective 
characteristics. 
“ The Hog, ( Suidae. Sus of the ancients and Lin¬ 
naeus,) according to Cuvier, belongs to the class 
Mammalia, order Pachydermata, genus Suidae or 
Sus, having on each foot two large principal toes, shod 
with stout hoofs, and two lateral toes much shorter 
and scarcely touching the earth; the incisors variable 
in number, the lower incisors all levelled forwards; 
the canines projected from the mouth and re-curved 
upwards; the muzzle terminated by a truncated snout, 
fitted for turning up the ground; the stomach but little 
divided; the body square and thick, and more or less 
covered with bristles and hairs; the neck strong and 
muscular; the legs short and stout.” All this species 
feed on plants, and especially on roots, which their 
snout or trunk enables them to grub out of the earth; 
they will devour animal substances, but rarely hunt or 
destroy animals for the purpose of devouring them. 
They are thick-skinned; said to oe obtuse in most of 
their faculties, excepting in the olfactory and oral 
senses; voracious; bold in defending themselves; and 
delight in humid and shady places;, 
To this order belong the elephant, the rhinoceros, 
the hippopotamus, &c., the general characteristics of 
all of which are very similar. 
Under the generic term Suidae or Sus, many zoolo¬ 
gists have included, besides the true hog as it exists 
in a wild or tame state in Europe, Asia, and Africa, 
the peccary, the babiroussa, the phaco-choere, and the 
capibara.* 
* Mr. Youatt states, however, that there are such material dif¬ 
ferences between the peccary and the common hog, that they 
should not be reckoned in the same genus. 
Use of Swine’s Flesh. —In regard to the use ol 
swine’s flesh by the ancients, it is observed:— 
‘ 1 As far back as the records of history enable us to 
go, the hog appears to have been known, and his flesh 
made use of as food. 1491 years before Christ, Moses 
gave those laws to the Israelites which have occasioned 
so much discussion, and given rise to the many opin¬ 
ions which we shall presently have to speak of; and it 
is quite evident that had not pork then been the pre¬ 
vailing food of that nation, such stringent command¬ 
ments and prohibitions would not have been necessary. 
The various allusions to this kind of meat, which occur 
again and again in the writings of the old Greek au¬ 
thors, plainly testify the esteem in which it was held 
among the nation, and it appears that the Romans 
actually made the art of breeding, rearing, and fatten¬ 
ing pigs, a study, which they designated Porculatio. 
Every art was put in practice to impart a finer and 
more delicate flavor to the flesh : the poor animals 
were fed, and crammed, and tortured to death in vari¬ 
ous ways, many of them too horrible to be described, 
in order to gratify the epicurism and gluttony of this 
people. Pliny Worms us that they fed swine on dried 
figs, and drenched them to repletion with honeyed 
wine, in order to produce a diseased and monstrous¬ 
sized liver. The Porcus Trojanus, so called in allu¬ 
sion to the Trojan horse, was a very celebrated dish, 
and one that eventually became so extravagantly ex¬ 
pensive that a sumptuary law was passed respecting 
it. This dish consisted in a whole hog, with the en¬ 
trails drawn out, and the inside stuffed with thrushes, 
larks, beccaficoes, oysters, nightingales, and delicacies 
of every kind, and the whole bathed in wine and rich 
gravies. Another great dish was the hog served 
whole, the one side roasted and the other boiled.” 
Prohibition of Swine’s Flesh.— In regard to the 
prohibition against the use of pork by Moses, Mr. 
