about seeking for plunder; swilling, grunting, rooting, pawing, always in mischief and always destroying. The more a man possesses of such stock the worse he is off; and he had far better sell his produce at any price, than to put it into such totally worthless creatures."—A. B. Allen.
Stuart says "Hogs are universal in this part of the world, and are well and frequently fed. At first they are kept in the woods, and nurtured on chestnuts and apples; before being killed, they have good rations of Indian corn or barley-meal, and in many cases are likewise well supplied with steamed food. In South Carolina the climate is so mild that they are allowed to wander about the woods during the whole year, feeding on the nuts, acorns, &c., which are there so abundant, and occasionally eating the fallen fruit they meet with. They are very useful in destroying snakes."—Stuart's North America.
In large towns, too, they are apparently as much at home and as common as in the forests, pacing the streets, instead of the glades, and feeding upon the offal and filth rejected by man, instead of the fresh and wholesome fruits supplied by the hand of nature. One of our countrymen gives an amusing graphic account of the swinish multitude, in some of the large towns through which he passed. "We are going to cross here. Take care of the pigs. Two portly sows are trotting up behind this carriage, and a select party of half-a-dozen gentlemen hogs have just now turned the corner. Here is a solitary swine, lounging homewards by himself; he has only one ear, having parted with the other to vagrant dogs in the course of his city rambles; but he gets on very well without it, and leads a roving, gentlemanly, vagabond kind of a life, somewhat answering to that of our clubmen at home. He leaves his lodgings every morning at a certain hour, throws himself upon the town, gets through his day in some manner quite satisfactory to himself, and regularly appears at the door of his own house again at night, like the mysterious master of Gil Blas; he is a free-and-easy, careless, indifferent kind of pig, having a very large acquaintance among other pigs of the same character, whom he rather knows by sight than conversation, as he seldom troubles himself to stop and exchange civilities, but goes grunting down the kennel, turning up the news and small-talk of the city, in the shape of cabbage-stalks and offal, and bearing no tails but his own, which is a very short one, for his old enemies the dogs have been at that too, and have left him hardly enough to swear by; he is in every respect a republican pig, going wherever he pleases, and mingling with the best society, on an equal, if not superior footing, for every one makes way when he appears, and the haughtiest give him the wall if he prefer it; he is a great philosopher, and seldom moved unless by the dogs before-mentioned; sometimes, indeed, you may see him
