Page:The Hog.djvu/34

32 In Germany almost every village has its swineherd, who at break of day goes from house to house collecting his noisy troop, blowing his still more noisy cow-horn, and cracking his clumsy whip, until the place echoes with the din. The following very amusing account of that important personage, the Schwein-General, has lately been given in a popular work:

"Every morning I hear the blast of a horn, when, proceeding from almost every door in the street, behold a pig! The pigs generally proceed of their own accord; but shortly after they have passed, there comes a little bare-headed, bare-footed, stunted child about eleven years old. This little attendant of the old pig-driver facetiously called at Langen-Schwalbach the 'Schwein-General, knows every house from which a pig ought to have proceeded: she can tell by the door being open or shut, or even by footmarks, whether the creature has joined the herd, or is still snoring in its sty. A single glance determines whether she shall pass a yard, or enter it; and if a pig, from indolence or greediness, be loitering on the road, the sting of the wasp cannot be sharper or more spiteful than the cut she gives it.

"Besides the little girl who brought up the rear, the herd was preceded by a boy of about fourteen, whose duty it was not to let the foremost advance too fast. In the middle of the drove, surrounded like a shepherd by his flock, slowly stalked the 'Schwein-General.' In his left hand he held a staff, while round his right shoulder hung a terrific whip. At the end of a short handle, turning upon a swivel, there was a lash about nine feet long, each joint being an iron ring, which, decreasing in size, was closely connected with its neighbor by a band of hard greasy leather. The pliability, the weight, and the force of this iron whip, rendered it an argument which the obstinacy even of the pig was unable to resist; yet, as the old man proceeded down the town, he endeavored to speak kindly to the herd.

"As soon as the herd had got out of the town, they began gradually to ascend the rocky, barren mountain which appeared towering above them, and then the labors of the Schwein-General and his staff became greater than ever; in due time the drove reached the ground which was devoted for that day's exercise, the whole mountain being thus taken in regular succession.

"In this situation do the pigs remain every morning for four hours, enjoying little else but air and exercise. At about nine or ten o'clock they begin their march homeward, and nothing can form a greater contrast than their entry does to their exit from their native town.

"Their eager anxiety to get to the dinner trough that awaits them is almost ungovernable, and they no sooner reach the first houses of the town than away each of them starts towards his home.

"At half-past four the same horn is heard again; the pigs once