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THE HOG.
CHAPTER IV
The Wild Boar—Description of him—Characteristics—the Female and her young—Hunting the Wild Boar—Homer's description of a Boar-hunt—Roman festivals and games—the Wild Boar in England and Scotland—in France—in Germany—Mode of hunting the boar in Germany—Wild Boar park of the Emperor of Austria—Present wild breed in Germany—in Hungary—in the Styrian Alps—in Russia and Sweden—In the East—Habits of the Wild Hog in India—Wild Hog hunting in India—The wild breed in America—Fearful conflict with a wild herd in Columbia—The Wild Boar the parent stock of all domesticated breeds—Resemblances between—Alterations produced by domestication—Resumption of old habits on again becoming free from control of man.
The wild boar (sus scrofa; var. aper) 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
THE WILD BOAR.
with a downy wool; these hairs become bristles as they approach the neck and shoulders, and are here so long as to form a species of 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 towards the neck, the jaw armed with sharp crooked tusks
