CHAPTER VIII.
THE GULLET.
The gullet, or œsophagus, is a musculo-membranous tube, commencing at the pharynx, passing down the throat on the left side of the windpipe, entering the chest in company with that tube, penetrating through the folds of the diaphragm, and terminating in the stomach through an orifice termed the cardia.
THE STOMACH.
The stomach of the hog is a much more simple apparatus than that of the ox and sheep; it is a truly omnivorous one, and beautifully adapted by its pyramidal appendage and glandular structure, as well as by the villous mucous membrane with which it is lined, for the digestion of the heterogeneous food which it is destined to receive, being, perhaps, more analogous to that of the horse than to any other animal. In form it is globulous. Its large blind cavity is very voluminous, and is surmounted in front by a hood-like appendage. The narrow long portion which abuts on the pylorus, greatly resembles this hood-shaped appendage. On each side of the cardia are two transversal folds, and the cardia itself is half way between the pylorus and the large cavity.
The stomach has three coats,—the outermost, or peritoneum, which constitutes the common covering of all the intestines; the muscular or fibrous coat, which acts upon, and mingles the food, and prepares it for digestion; and the mucous or villous coat, which is peculiarly developed in the pig, and into which open the mouths of numerous little vessels, conveying the gastric juice to the semi-digested food, and by its action conveying it into a pultaceous fluid, commonly called chyme.
THE INTESTINES.
The intestines of the hog bear a stronger resemblance to those of the human being than we find in any other animal. They are sixteen times the length of the body of the animal, and the proportions of the small intestines to the large are as three to one. They are composed of four coats or layers. The outer or peritoneal one is
