Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1877-05-22
FITLiD AND EEsfDIEi > {
=. A Good Word for the Hog.

He is one of the pachydermatous or thick
skinned animals, of which the existing genera
are the elephant, the hippopotamus,t the hyraz,
the tapir, the hog. The elephant, which
once spread in countless herds to the polar
regions, is now confined tothe woods Of the
tropics; the rhiuoceros, yet more rare, is
limited to the hottest regions of India and
Africa the hippopotamus, one of the hugest
of living auadrupeds. is confined TO the largest
rivers of Africa the tapir merely fingers in
some of the forests of inter tropical countries;
but the hog survives the revolutions of count.
less ages and is reproduced in countless null
titudes in every region of the earth. esrs
However .grovolling and mean may appear
his habits wien reduced to the degradation
of slavery. yet he is not destitute of sagacity,
nor unsusceptible of attachment. When he
lives in the cabin of the peasant, he loses
much of his rudeness, suffers himself to be
caressed, and recognizes his protectors En-
stances are known in which the hog, for the
purposes of exhibition, has been taught to
perform number of feats, displaying mar
yelous degree of dociIity. n
Intractaele, rapacious and selfish, as we are
wont to esteem this animal, no mother is more
tender to her young or moro .resolute in their
defence. Hogs are not inscnsble to natural
affections; they are gregarious and social,
warming one another with their bodies in
cold weather; and, when assembled in herds
manifesting the utmost sympathy for one
anoth RS suferings. Shoull one give signal
of distress, all within hearing rush to his as
sistance they gather round their comrade
and fercely assail the largest animals tina.
have injured him. In Calabria, where they
are grazed in herds, the keeper uses n kind
of bagpipe, which, when at sunset they are
to be driven home8ard, instantly collects
them from all parts. In certain villages there
is common swinehcrd in the morning
when he sounds his horn, all the pigs rush
forth and follow him to the place of feeding
in the evening they return under his gui-
dance, aud when they enter the village each
runs to his own sty without mistake. In
some of the Southern United States, it is
usual to turn the pigs into the woods, but to
collect them together once q week, by giving
them salt and maize, or other favorite food.
At the very hour they are to receive their
weekly present. they 'reassemble from all
parts, without a straggler. They have the
sagaeity always to discover the food that suits
them, never being, like some other animals
whose senses are blunted by domesticatioD,
poisoned by the plants they find in the wild
state Their exquisite senses of smell and
touch direct them to carth>nuts and other
roots, aeorns anu the Ike. winch are found
buried in the ground. They are conscious of
an impending storm, and carry straw as if to
shelter themselves from its violence They
are agitated when the wind blows violently,
screaming and running to the sty for shelter,
which has given rise to this singular saying
of the country people. that 'pigs see the
wind" Fhe explanation is that the hog
breads wetness and cold. and is eminently
sensitive to coming changes of the weather.
[Ptof Lou, in Nat. LiUe Stock Jour'l.