Wild boar

“ 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. ”

“ Many of the forests in our own country were infested by wild boars. The Anglo-Saxons seem, from the rude frescoes and prints which are handed down to us, to have hunted this animal on foot with no other weapon but the boar-spear, and attended by powerful dogs ”

“ The hounds devoured the wild boar's entrails, and snarled and fought for them, while the prickers and the gentlemen, standing in a circle round the spoil, blew their horns as loud as they could. The flourish of the hunting-horns sounded beyond the woods on that still night and was repeated by the echoes of the distant valleys, awaking the timid stags, rousing the yelping foxes and disturbing the little rabbits in their gambols at the edge of the rides. ”

“ Very different is he from his tame brethren with which we are acquainted—old grunters, who wallow about the mud-puddles and sleep serenely for hours, with their fat sides baking in the sun. The wild boar is as fast as a horse, and as savage as the crossest bull. He can run so that you can scarcely catch up to him with your nag at the top of his speed, and when you do reach him he will be very apt, if you are not watchful, to rip up your horse with his tusks and cut some terrible gashes in your own legs, besides. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The wild boar is a very active and powerful animal, and becomes fiercer as he grows older. When he exists in a state of nature, he will usually be 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-canes, rice, or rhur, or in the thick patches of high, long grass. [1] In England, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, their resorts have been in the woods and forests. ”

“ The wild boar is to be met with in various parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa. The hunting of this animal has always afforded a rather barbarous sport to the natives of the countries in which it is to be found. The season for this sport is in the beginning of winter. The huntsmen ride with the dogs, and encourage them at the same time that, by the spear, they endeavor to dishearten the boar. ”

“ Wild boars often have dreadful combats with each other. In this engraving we have a representation of such a fight. The weapons with which they fight are sharp tusks growing out of the under jaw. With these tusks they can inflict dreadful wounds.
Savages, when they attack the wild boar, arm themselves with spears, and station themselves at different places in the forest, where they think the boar will pass. Sometimes they hide themselves in thickets, so as to be ready to come out suddenly and attack the boar when the dogs have seized him. ”

“ It is useless to hunt wild pig until the leaves are off the trees, for your only hope is to find them feeding on the hillsides in the morning or early evening. Then they will often come into the open or the thin forests, and you can have a fair shot across a ravine or from the summit of a hill. If they are in the brush it is well-nigh impossible to see them at all. A wild boar is very clever at eluding his pursuers, and for his size can carry off more lead and requires more killing than any other animal of which I know. ”

“ We can well imagine the damage that would be done to a vineyard even by the domesticated Swine, but the Wild Boar is infinitely more destructive. It is of very great size, often resembling a donkey rather than a boar, and is swift and active beyond conception. The Wild Boar is scarcely recognisable as the very near relation of the domestic species. It runs with such speed, that a high-bred horse finds some difficulty in overtaking it, while an indifferent steed would be left hopelessly behind. ”

“ At this time of the year the wild boar becomes so fat that he cannot run far when pursued by the dogs. When they have chased him for two hours, he strikes into a thicket and comes to bay there.
Then the hunters run to the place where he is at bay and shoot him. By the barking of the dogs one can tell whether the boar has taken to cover or is still running. If he is running, then the dogs bark with a yelp, as if some one were beating them; but if he has taken to cover, then they bay with a long howl, as if at a man. ”

“ The wild boar is fond of vast forests, in which it seeks the darkest and most retired spots where it will not be disturbed by man’s presence. In the daytime it lies in its retreat or lair amid the thickest of brushwood and bushes. In the neighborhood there is generally some sort of muddy pool where it wallows with delight. Toward nightfall it leaves its retreat in search of food. With its snout it plows the ground, always in a straight line, to unearth fleshy roots ”

“ In its habits the Wild Boar is by choice herbivorous, feeding on plants, fruits, and roots; but it will also eat Snakes, Lizards, and various insects, and when pressed by hunger nothing appears to come amiss to its voracious appetite; it is stated that even dead Horses are sometimes called into requisition. ”

“ Although now extinct in these Islands, the wild boar is to be found plentifully at the present day in France, Germany, Austria, Russia, and Spain, Greece, Albania, and other countries of the Mediterranean. In most parts of Europe the wild boar is shot during forest drives, but in the Caucasus and round the Black Sea the hardy peasants lie in wait for these animals by the fruit-trees on autumn nights or waylay them going to the water and shoot them single-handed. ”

“ OF THE WILD BOAR AND OF HIS NATURE
A wild boar is a common beast enough and therefore it needeth not to tell of his making, for there be few gentlemen that have not seen some of them. It is the beast of this world that is strongest armed, and can sooner slay a man than any other. Neither is there any beast that he could not slay if they were alone sooner than that other beast could slay him,66 be they lion or leopard, unless they should leap upon his back, so that he could not turn on them with his teeth. ”

“ It seems to me that the Bear scratches the trees, not for the purpose of shewing its size or its strength, but merely for that of sharpening its teeth and claws, to enable it better to encounter a rival of its own species during the amatory season. The Wild Boar of Europe clashes its tusks and scrapes the earth with its feet, and the Deer rubs its antlers against the lower part of the stems of young trees or bushes, for the same purpose. ”

“ The parent stock of our domestic swine is the wild boar, which inhabits the forests of France, Germany, and other parts of Europe, as well as those of Persia and India.
Wild boars usually live in families, and are hunted, as an amusement, in all the parts of the world where they are found. The flesh of the wild animals, if they are not old, is said to be much superior to that of our domestic swine. That of the young ones is peculiarly delicate. Of an old wild boar the head only is eatable. ”

“ I saw one in India that weighed four hundred and fifty-six pounds, and had tusks about ten inches long. The peculiarity of the wild boar is his powerful tusks; they have an awkward appearance, but he can do terrible execution with them, ripping up the flank of a horse as though the horn of a bull had passed through it, and tearing a dog or man to pieces in a few moments. As I told you, when we started in on the hunt, it is well to be cautious about attacking a full-grown boar, on account of the danger from his tusks. ”

“ When at last he is shot, the boar is capital eating. His flesh is far superior to common pork, possessing the peculiar delicate flavor which belongs to most wild meat. If we could shoot a wild boar every few days, we would be sure to fare very well during our hunting expedition.
But we must press on after other game, and we will now try and get a shot at a musk-ox. We shall have to go somewhat out of our way to find this animal, for he lives in the upper portions of North America, but an ocean and a continent or two are not at all difficult to cross—in a book. ”

“ The less the sow, after bringing forth her young, is meddled with, the more comfortable her bedding, the more regularly and gently she has been previously managed and treated, the less likely is she to violate one of the great laws of nature.
"The wild boar, as we have said, is a dangerous animal; and so indeed, to a certain extent, is the domestic boar of some of the larger breeds. Instances are not unfrequent of boars turning furiously upon their keepers, especially if interfered with when in company with the female, or if constrained to quit her society. ”

“ Dogs avail but little; a deadly gash lays open their ribs, and a side-thrust of a wild boar will cut into the most muscular leg, and for ever destroy its tendons. We have done with pigs, and would only recommend a visit—a frequent visit—to that paradise of animals, the Zoological Gardens, where, a fortnight ago, we saw wild boars from Hesse Darmstadt; wild boars from Egypt; bush pigs from Africa; peccaries from South America; and two painted pigs from West Africa ”

“ These animals have lost some little of their natural ferocity, but they still fly at the approach of strangers, and in their form and habits preserve all the characteristics of the true wild boar, from which stock they are descended without intermixture of any other breed. I am told, too, that their flesh has all the peculiar flavor of the wild boar. This animal, in a completely savage state, is now becoming very scarce in Hungary, and is only met with in the most secluded forests, and in the recesses of the Carpathian mountains. ”

“ The wild boar is a great nuisance to the station holders and farmers in the hills and back country, as he disregards all boundaries and takes a delight in making gaps so that the sheep of adjoining owners may make neighbourly calls upon each other. ”

“ To do this, the wild boars were given two long tusks, as pointed as needles and sharp as knives. With one sweep of his head a boar could rip open a dog or a wolf, a bull or a bear, or furrow the earth like a ploughshare.
Now there were several cousins in the Tusk family. The elephant on land, and the walrus and narwhal in the seas; but none of these could plough ground, but because the boar's tusks grew out so long and were so sharp, and hooked at the end, it could tear open the earth's hard crust and root up the ground. ”

“ There is every reason to believe that the domestic pig is descended from one or another of the numerous kinds of wild boar scattered over Asia—perhaps even from several of them. But the Asiatic wild boar bears so close a resemblance in shape and habits to the European that it will suffice for me to acquaint you with the latter in order to give you a correct idea of the former, and thus show you what the pig must have been in its primitive state. ”

“ The wild boar, who has a stronger snout than the domestic one, digs deeper, and nearly in a straight line, while the latter does it very irregularly.
The wild boars do not separate from their mothers until the third year, and to which age they are called by hunters flock-beasts, from that circumstance. They never go alone until they are strong enough to encounter the wolf. At that time they form themselves into flocks, and if attacked, the largest and strongest front the enemy, and by pressing against the weak ones keep them in the middle ”

“ All day their bodies are cooled and refreshed by water. I wish I were a boar.” Accordingly at night he recounted to the Rishi the troubles of the life of an ape and the pleasures of that of a boar, and begged of him to change him into a boar. The sage, whose kindness knew no bounds, complied with his pet’s request, and turned him into a wild boar. For two whole days our boar kept his body soaking wet, and on the third day, as he was splashing about in his favourite element, whom [135] should he see but the king of the country riding on a richly caparisoned elephant. ”

“ It would seem that all those species, such as the wild boar, or the buffalo and bison, which are widely distributed on many continents, adapt themselves rapidly to changed conditions of climate; and those wild boars which have been bred for several generations in this country and in Scotland, are rapidly developing a thicker and rougher coat of hair than their Indian cousins. ”

“ And if a man see a wild boar the which seemeth to him great enough, as men say of the hart chaceable of ten, he shall say a wild boar of the third year that is without refusal, and whenever they be not of three years men call them swine of the sounder, and if he see the great tokens that I shall rehearse hereafter he may say that he is a great boar. ”

“ Inhabits, for the most part, marshes and woods, and is of a black or brown colour: his flesh is very tender and good for food. The Wild Boar has tusks, which are sometimes nearly a foot in length, and have often proved dangerous to men, as well as to dogs in the chase. His life is confined to about thirty years; his food consists of vegetables; but when pressed by hunger, he devours animal flesh. This creature is strong and fierce, and undauntedly turns against his pursuers. To hunt him is one of the principal amusements of the grandees in those countries where he is to be found. ”