Weekly Chillicothe crisis. (Chillicothe, Livingston Co., Mo.) 1878-19??, 1885-03-12
Hogs and Hog Killing.

| Will say Il few words relative to
our native hogs. Hogs? Yes sir,
hogs! American hogs that plow deep
furrows in the garden among the
squash and pea vines, and revolution
izc the earth anent the cucumber and
parSnip beds.
Those identical hogs that in sleepy
solitude wander out in the morning
sunshine and revel upon the milky
sweet corn and infantilc water mel
! ons, and tickle the crimped edge but
ter squash under the chin with their
hairy br'stlUS.
The cccentricities of the hog are
numerous There is dreamy, wist.
full look about the countenance of the
average hog when in repose that sug-
gcsts deep, overhanging sorrow,
which can only be broken by taking a
fence board and swatting him across
the back bone, when he will immedi-
ately brighten up, say good evening
and dash quickly between your legs
oh, so quickly.
This is often embarrassing to the
swatler, when performed in the pres
cnco OF company, but the hog enjoys
| it.
The hog has acquired considerable
note as a runner. lie is shown off to
best advantage in u cOrn-iield with a
man carrying hay rake in close pur-
suit. | have seen large pig, free
from general debility, keepJust eleven
| feet ahead of the farmer in hotlv con-
tested race around a corn-tield, and
run past tho gate seventeen or eighteen
consecutive times before induced TO
invade his normal sphere again.
Never feel too overly confident of a
hog. He is full of meanness and
treacherous undertakings.
Hog killing and pork packing has
risen to vast industry IN this coun-
try, a gigantic monopoly. And our
pork is slapped atwart tho counters
not only of our own country, but
those of a foreign strand.
Years ago, when the abnormally
reticent redman roamed the plains,
they were about the only ones who
ever did much hog killing. The settler
raised the hogs and the red man rails
ed the settlers hair, after which he
borrowed his gun, without objection
of the owner, and did the hog killing,
The tol collected by the Indians for
hog killing in those days was consid-
erablc And yet the settlers rarely
complained. A man can't very well
worry about domestic infelicities
with n large irregular hole shot
through under his fifth rib, and the
whole area of his dome of thought
peeled off and laid aside.
1t is very difierenr with our farmers
now. They do their own butchering,
reserve the toll formerly collected by
the Indians, and it is salted down for
rainy day. They also save enough
natural hair, which in early times was
appropriated by the redman, to make
it quite an object.
remember once attending the muir
der of large ambitious hog, commit
ted by an amateur butcher. He had
driven large cheese knife into the
hogs internal improvements seven or
eight times, and had dissected his
wind.pipe, together with large por.
tion OF his digestive apparatus but the
hog refused to die.
lie was the most obstinate pig have
eve, seen. / took hold of his hind
legs and endoavored to alleviate his
suflerings by rolling him over, when
his legs suddenly recoiled. Did you
ever SEQ hog in dying strains recoil
his legs? A jerky, quivering spas
modic Tecoil that ills the sorrowing
eyes of the unterrified with briny
waste / felt just that way my
self.
Bending over the hog said, "Poor
piggy, it will soon be ovor," Then his
feet shot out and caught me some
where In the waist band, and l per-
formed a beautiful but very irregular
parabola over the fence into row Of
raspberry bushes. ! paused then and
there In that hog-killlng business. ]
have paused over pIuoe,