Page:The Hog.djvu/98

96 small, sharp ears; the limbs are short and fine-boned, the barrel is rounded, the hams very full, the hair is spare and short, the skin fine; some have small wattles or appendages of skin depending from the neck. These animals fatten quickly, grow rapidly, and yield very superior meat; as porkers they are admirable, the meat being peculiarly delicate. The hogs, when fattened, will sometimes weigh 360 to 400 lbs., often 250 to 280.

This black breed is greatly crossed with the Neapolitan, and we believe the Sussex.

A modification of this breed is often seen in Essex; the pigs, like the Sussex, are generally black and white the head and hinder parts being black, and the central portion of the body white. They are admirable in shape, with a deep round carcass, and fine skin, fine in the bone, and full in the hind quarters. The flesh is excellent. The sows produce large litters, but are said not to make the best nurses. We did not, however, hear this complaint from any of the Essex farmers, during our frequent visits to Rochford and the adjacent country. We suspect, however, that the Essex breed is delicate, and requires care, as indeed do all high-bred domestic quadrupeds.

Sussex possesses a breed very much like the last particolored race, of which it appears to be a variety. These pigs are well-made, of middle size, with a thin skin, and scanty bristles; the snout is tapering and fine, the ears upright and pointed, the jowl deep, the body compactly rounded. These pigs arrive early at maturity, and fatten quickly; the bacon hogs averaging a weight of 280 lbs. The flesh is excellent. Their bone, perhaps, is larger than in the Essex breed, but then the improved stocks of this latter race are remarkable for smallness of bone, and we doubt whether they are more bony than the improved stocks of the old Berkshire strain. The breed is undoubtedly valuable, and well adapted for crossing with the Essex, Neapolitan, or Chinese.

Sussex once boasted of a gigantic race of pigs, known by the name of the Rudgwick breed, (Rudgwick is a village in that county,) some of which were among the largest swine ever reared in our island. As is the case with all huge breeds, these animals were slow feeders and huge feeders; but yielded an enormous weight of excellent meat. Nevertheless, they became more and more influenced by the intercrossings of new breeds, till at length the old stock has become obsolete, its celebrity depending upon records and notices of the last century.

Bedfordshire has sent some admirable pigs to the great cattle-shows in London. Nevertheless, the animals could not be called truly Bedfordshire as to peculiarity of breed. They were crosses of various kinds, in which, as it appeared to us, the Suffolk strain was prevalent.