Pigs are exceedingly fond of comfort and warmth, and will nestle together in order to obtain the latter, and often struggle vehemently to secure the warmest berth. They are likewise peculiarly sensitive of approaching changes in the weather, and may often be observed suddenly leaving the places in which they had been quietly feeding, and running off to their styes at full speed, making loud outcries. When storms are overhanging, they collect straw in their mouths, and run about as if inviting their companions to do the same; and if there is a shed or shelter near at hand, they will carry it there and deposit it, as if for the purpose of preparing a bed.
In their domesticated state, they are, undeniably, very greedy animals; eating is the business of their lives; nor do they appear to be very delicate as to the kind or quality of food which is placed before them. Although naturally herbivorous animals, they have been known to devour carrion with all the voracity of beasts of prey, to eat and mangle infants, and even gorge their appetites with their own young. It is not, however, unreasonable to believe that the last revolting act—rarely if ever happening in a state of nature—arises more from the pain and irritation produced by the state of confinement, and often filth, in which the animal is kept, and the disturbances to which it is subjected, than from any actual ferocity; for it is well known that a sow is always unusually irritable at this period, snapping at all animals that approach her. If she is gently treated, properly supplied with sustenance, and sequestered from all annoyance, there is little danger of this practice ever happening.
All the offences which swine commit are attributed to a disposition innately bad; whereas they too often arise from bad management, or total neglect. They are legitimate objects for the sport of idle boys, hunted with curs, pelted with stones, often neglected and obliged to find a meal for themselves, or wander about half-starved. Made thus the Ishmaelites of our domestic animals, is it a matter of wonder that they should, under such circumstances, incline to display Ishmaelitish traits? In any well-regulated farm-yard, the swine are as tractable and as little disposed to wander or trespass as any of the animals that it contains.
The wild boar is generally admitted to be the parent of the stock from which all our domesticated breeds and varieties have sprung. This animal is generally of a dusky brown or iron-gray color, inclining to black, and diversified with black spots or streaks. The body is covered with coarse hairs, intermixed with a downy wool; these hairs become bristles as they approach the neck and shoulders, and are in those places so long as to form a mane, which the animal erects when irritated. The head is short, the forehead broad and flat, the ears short, rounded at the tips, and inclined toward the neck, the jaw armed with sharp, crooked tusks, which curve slightly upward, and are capable of inflicting fearful wounds, the eye full, neck thick and muscular, the shoulders high, the loins broad, the tail stiff, and finished off with a tuft of bristles at the tip, the haunch well turned, and the leg strong. A full-grown wild boar in India averages from thirty to forty inches in height at the shoulder; the African wild boar is about twenty-eight or thirty inches high.
The wild boar is a very active and powerful animal, and becomes fiercer as he grows older. When existing in a state of nature, he is generally found in moist, shady, and well-wooded situations, not far remote from streams or water. In India, they are found in the thick jungles, in plantations of sugar-cane or rice, or in the thick patches of high, long grass. In England, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, their resorts have been in the woods and forests. This animal is naturally herbivorous, and appears to feed by choice upon plants, fruits, and roots. He will, however, eat the worms and larvæ which he finds in the ground, also snakes and other such reptiles, and the eggs of birds. They seldom quit their coverts during the day, but prowl about in search of food during twilight and the night. Their acute sense of smell enables them to detect the presence of roots or fruits deeply imbedded in the soil, and they often do considerable mischief by ploughing up the ground in search of them, particularly as they do not, like the common hog, root up a little spot here and there, but plough long, continuous, furrows.
The wild boar, properly so called, is neither a solitary nor a gregarious animal. For the first two or three years, the whole herd follows the sow, and all unite in defence against any enemies, calling upon each other with loud cries in case of emergency, and forming in regular line of battle, the weakest occupying the rear. When arrived at maturity, the animals wander alone, as if in perfect consciousness of their strength, and appear as if they neither sought nor avoided any living creature. They are reputed to live about thirty years; as they grow old, the hair becomes gray, and the tusks begin to show symptoms of decay. Old boars rarely associate with a herd, but seem to keep apart from the rest, and from each other.
The female produces but one litter in the year, much smaller in number than those of the domestic pig; she carries her young sixteen or twenty weeks, and generally is only seen with the male during the rutting season. She suckles her young for several months, and continues to protect them for some time afterward; if attacked at that time, she will defend herself and them with exceeding courage and fierceness. Many sows will often be found herding together, each followed by her litter of young; and in such parties they are exceedingly formidable to man and beast. Neither they nor the boar, however, seem desirous of attacking any thing; and only when roused by aggression, or disturbed in their retreat, do they turn upon their enemies and manifest the mighty strength with which Nature has endowed them. When attacked by dogs, the wild boar at first sullenly retreats, turning upon them from time to time and menacing them with his tusks; but gradually his anger rises, and at length he stands at bay, fights furiously for his life, and tears and rends his persecutors. He has even been observed to single out the most tormenting of them, and rush savagely upon him. Hunting this animal has been a favorite sport, in almost all countries in which it has been found, from the earliest ages.
THE WILD BOAR AT BAY.
Wild boars lingered in the forests of England and Scotland for several centuries after the Norman conquest, and many tracts of land in those countries derived their name from this circumstance; while instances of valor in their destruction are recorded in the heraldic devices of many of their noble families. The precise period at which the animal became exterminated there cannot be precisely ascertained. They had, however, evidently been long extinct in the time of Charles I., since he endeavored to re-introduce them, and was at considerable expense to procure a wild boar and his mate from Germany. They still exist in Upper Austria, on the Syrian Alps, in many parts of Hungary, and in the forests of Poland, Spain, Russia, and Sweden; and the inhabitants of those countries hunt them with hounds, or attack them with fire-arms, or with the proper boar-spear.