Page:The Hog.djvu/67

65 cradle suspended upon a pole, carried by two men. But he says, "the difficulty is to get the animal into this conveyance, and this is accomplished by the cradle being placed in front of the pig, and the owner then vigorously pulling at 'porky's tail,' and in the spirit of opposition the animal darts into the place they have prepared for him. At the journey's end, the bearers dislodge him by spitting in his face."

Mr. Lay states that "pork is very plentiful in China, but never agreeable to the European eye, from its shining, flabby appearance; it does not taste either like our pork, and is only tolerable when cut into thin slices and fried in soy to correct the grossness of its natural juices. The natives cut it in long slices or rashers, and dry it in the sun, and thus prepared it is not unpleasant in flavor, although it is then by no means easy to distinguish it from dogs' or cats' flesh similarly prepared."

In speaking of Ceylon, and its neighborhood, an intelligent traveller says: "The swine here are a long-legged, ugly breed, allowed to run wild and pick up whatever food they can get. I never saw, at any native cottage or farm, a pig penned up or put to fatten, and yet the natives are very fond of hog's flesh, and never hold any feast or festival without this meat constituting the chief and most approved dishes."

The existence of a breed of swine in Hindostan and the Birmese empire is mentioned by several travellers, but scarcely one gives any account of them. It would seem, however, that they are identical with the Siamese breed. Hogs are also enumerated as among the wild beasts of Central India. Some of the Hindoo tribes use hog's blood for all the purposes to which other nations apply holy water; but pork is not eaten, excepting by Europeans and the lowest caste of Hindoos. In the Eastern Archipelago and the Moluccas, a breed of wild swine exists bearing great resemblance to the Chinese, but rather longer in the legs and lighter in the body, and affording delicious meat.

In Turkey, Syria, Persia, Arabia, and the north-eastern parts of Asia, comparatively few pigs are found, and these are of an iron-gray, black, and occasionally brown hue; short-legged, small, round in the body, very apt to fatten, and attaining the weight of from 350 to 400 lbs. And there are two ways of accounting for this,