Page:The Hog.djvu/212

210 and the meals should be given frequently, but only in moderation at each time,—over-gorging is sure to cause indigestion, and the only remedy for this is abstinence; a little sulphur occasionally mingled with their food is useful. When the store hogs are first put up (and we must suppose them in moderate condition), the food should only be a few degrees superior to that on which they have already fed; it should be improved step by step, till the digestive powers are adapted for that of the most nutritious quality; and with this the fattening must be completed.

"A bacon-hog is generally fattened in autumn, and killed about Christmas,—sometimes after Christmas, sometimes a few weeks before. The average length of time required for bringing the animal into good condition, varies from about fourteen to twenty-one weeks, according to size and breed. Some fatten hogs until they are incapable of moving, from the enormous load of fat with which they are burthened, and in order to accomplish this, four, five, or even six months are required. An animal so fed will certainly not pay for its food, nor can it be deemed in health; the heart and lungs will be oppressed, the circulation impeded, and the breathing laborious; sufficient fatness is all that is desirable. A fat hog is a comely, comfortable-looking animal, the embodied type of epicurean felicity; but a bloated, overladen hog is a disgusting object, uneasy and distressed in its own feelings, incapable even of enjoying its food, buried in its excessive fat.

"The quantity of barley-meal, pea-meal, or other farinaceous food (exclusive of wash, skim-milk, &c.) consumed by a hog during the time of its fattening for bacon, will vary greatly according to the size and breed of the animal. Taking the average, and supposing the pig's age to be fourteen or fifteen months, and the animal to be in fair condition, we should say that ten or twelve bushels of meal (that is, barley-meal, pea-meal, &c.) would be sufficient for every useful purpose; well do we know that much less often suffices. But we are supposing the production of first-rate bacon. Porkers, of course, require a less outlay according to their age. A porker ought not to carry too much fat; neither the feeder nor the buyer profit by over-fed pork, though perhaps the pork-butcher may—he retails it per pound to his customers. Our observations, however, do not apply to the respectable dealers in pork in London and its environs, who exhibit the most delicious country-fed meat, and justly pride themselves upon an article of consumption which brings them the first-rate custom.

"With respect to the estimated tables relative to the increase in weight of hogs, under certain modes of feeding, and under given quantities of food, we hold them to be utterly fallacious. The feeder's means, the produce of his grounds, the breed he adopts, and the proportion of attention he bestows on the porcine part of his stock,