The sow, wild sow, and the hog which is cut, have these canine teeth in the under jaw, but they do not grow like those of the boar, and scarcely appear out of the mouth. Beside these sixteen teeth, that is twelve incisive and four canine, they have twenty-eight grinders, which make forty-four in the whole. The wild boar, ([fig. 29.]) has the tusks larger, the snout stronger, and the head longer than the domestic hog, ([fig. 28.]) his feet are always larger, his toes more separated, and his bristles always black.
Of all quadrupeds the hog appears the most rough and brutal, and the imperfections of his make seem to influence his nature; all his ways are uncouth, all his appetites unclean, all his sensations are confined to a furious lust and brutal gluttony; he devours, without distinction, every thing that comes in his way, even his own young soon after their birth. His voraciousness seems to proceed from the continual wants of his stomach, which is immoderately large; and the coarseness of his appetite is probably owing to the dullness of his senses, both as to taste and feeling. The roughness of the hair, hardness of the skin, and thickness of the fat, render these animals insensible to blows. Mice have been known to lodge on their backs, and to eat their skin and fat without their seeming sensible of it. Their other senses are good, and it is well known to huntsmen, that wild boars see, hear, and smell at a great distance, since in order to surprise them they are obliged to watch in silence during the night, and to place themselves opposite to the wind, to prevent them having notice of them by the smell, which invariably makes them change their road.
Engraved for Barr’s Buffon.
Fig. 29 Wild Boar
Fig. 28 Boar