Domesticated animals

by Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

Among our domesticated animals the pig is exceptional in the fact that it has been bred for its flesh alone; for although the hide is valuable and the hair serves certain purposes, as in the manufacture of brushes, these uses are only incidental and modern. They have not affected the plan of the breeder, whose aim has been to produce the largest weight of flesh in the shortest time, and with the least expenditure of food. In this peculiar task the success has been remarkable, the creature having been made to vary from its primitive condition in an extraordinary manner. In its wild state the species develops slowly, requiring, perhaps, three or four years to attain its maximum size. It never becomes very fat, but remains an agile, swift-footed, and fierce tenant of the wilds. Under the conditions of subjugation the pig has been brought to a state in which its qualities of mind and body have undergone a very great change. In the more developed breeds, even the males, when kept about the barnyard, are quiet-natured and not at all dangerous. The creatures have become slow-moving; they attain their full development in about half the time required for the growth of their wild kindred, and when adult they may outweigh them in the ratio of four to one.

The effect arising from the food-supply which our pigs afford is well seen in the use which is made of their flesh in all the ruder work of men, at least in the case of those of our race. Our soldiers and sailors are to a great extent fed on the flesh of these creatures, which lends itself readily to preservation by the use of salt. So rapidly can these animals be bred, owing to the number of young which they produce in a litter and the swiftness of their growth, that sudden demands for an increase in the supply, such as occurred at the outbreak of our civil war, can quickly be met. If the need should arise, the quantity of pork produced in this country could readily be doubled within eighteen months. This is the case with no other source of flesh-supply, and this fact gives the pig a peculiar importance.

Owing to the remarkably complete domestication of this animal, and also to the fact that it is omnivorous, the creature has ever been a favorite with the cotter class. Those folk, who can afford neither sheep nor horned cattle, can often provide the food for pigs, and thus, in turn, be much better fed than they would otherwise be.

It is only within two centuries that our pigs have attained to anything like the domestication in which we commonly find them. Of old they were allowed to range the forests, much as they do in certain parts of our Southern States at the present day. In some parts of Europe, particularly in the southern portion of the continent, this method of rearing and feeding is still common. It was and is advantageous, for the reason that the creature, by its remarkably keen sense of smelling and its singular capacity for overturning the ground, is able to provide itself with abundant food in the way of grubs and roots which are not at the disposition of any other animal. It was only as the public forests disappeared that pigs came to receive any considerable part of their provender from the products of tilled fields. In this stage of our agriculture, when all the land was possessed, the life of the pig was necessarily more restricted, and he became the denizen of a pen. In the earlier state there was no cost for his keeping; in the latter, except so far as he could be fed from the waste of a household, he is an expensive animal.

It is with this last state of the pig, when he became the most housed of our domesticated animals, that the work of the breeder really began. The aim of those who have developed the pig has been, as we have said, to obtain the most rapid growth along with the greatest weight of fat, and to accomplish the results with the least expenditure in the way of food. Although the animal has been subjected to selective experiments, looking to these ends, for not more than a century, or say about forty generations of the species, the amount of variation which has been attained is singularly great, the form and habits having been changed more rapidly, and in a larger measure, than in the case of any other of our domesticated animals. It may fairly be said that this creature is more obedient to the will of the practical selectionist than any other with which we have experimented.

It is commonly assumed that our pigs are among the least intelligent of the creatures which man has turned to his use. This impression is due to the fact that the conditions in which these animals are kept insure their degradation by cutting them off from all the natural mental training which wild animals, as well as the other tenants of the fields, receive. In the state of nature or in the condition of domestication which existed before pigs became captives in their pens, they were among the most alert and sagacious animals with which man has come in contact. Their wits were quick and their sympathies with their kind remarkably strong. Trainers have found these creatures more apt in receiving instruction than any other of our mammals, and the things which they can be made to do appear to indicate a native intelligence nearer to that of man than is found in any other species below the level of the apes.

As there is little in the books of anecdotes of animals concerning pigs, I venture to give an account of a learned individual of this species whose performances I had an opportunity of observing in much detail. The creature, an ordinary specimen about three years old, had been trained by a peasant in the mountain district of Virginia who made his living by instructing animals for show purposes. He stated that in selecting pigs for education it was his practice to choose those characterized by a considerable width between the eyes and whose skulls projected in this part of their periphery to a more than usual degree. He said that from many experiments he was satisfied that there was a very great difference in the capacity of the animals to receive training, and that the above-mentioned indices afforded him sufficient guidance in his choice.

In the exhibition about to be described there were but three persons present, myself, another spectator, and the showman. A score of cards were placed upon the ground, each bearing a numeral or the name of some distinguished person. These cards were in perfect disorder. I was allowed, indeed, repeatedly to change their position and to mix them up as I pleased. The pig was then told to pick out the name of Abraham Lincoln and bring it to his master. This he readily did. He was asked in what year Lincoln was assassinated. He slowly but without correction brought one by one the appropriate numerals and put them on the ground in due order. Half a dozen other questions concerning names and dates were answered in a similar way. Each success was rewarded with a grain of corn, and for his failures the creature received a reasonable drubbing. It was evident that the animal had to consider in making his choice of the cards. At times he was evidently much puzzled and would indicate his perplexity by squealing.

It seemed clear that the master of this learned pig did not guide the movements of the animal by other indications than words. The questions, in some cases, had to be reiterated in a loud voice in order to insure attention. Several times during the performance the pig rebelled, broke from the tent, and was with difficulty recaptured. The creature disliked this task in the manner of a lazy school-boy, and at the end of an hour of exercises seemed utterly overcome by his labor. He ran into the box where he was ordinarily confined, and when dragged forth, neither rewards nor punishments would quicken him to further work.

The above-described exhibition made it plain to me that the pig can be taught to understand a certain amount of human speech and to associate memories with phrases substantially as we do ourselves. It is perfectly clear that the performance which I witnessed was not a mere routine action, for I had a number of questions asked over again so as to make it sure that the creature acted with reference to each separate inquiry. The behavior of the animal during the performance seemed clearly to indicate mental effort and not mere automatic memory. His attitude when trying to determine which of two cards to take distinctly showed that he was intently viewing the figures and endeavoring to come to a decision. I am aware it has been suggested that learned pigs discriminate between the cards by peculiarities of odor which have been given to these bits of paper. I sought carefully to find if such was the case, and though I have a very keen sense of smell I found nothing which led me to suspect that this device was used. Even if such were the case, the rationality of the animal's action would be none the less clear. The showman assured me that he never used any such means in training pigs. He seemed, indeed, to treat the suggestion with contempt.