Uncle Dick and Lisa's Old Time Animal Tales

The Yankees can talk about hogs as cutely as whittle a pine shingle, and if some of the cutest could be placed in “the midst of a drove” in the “hog and hominy” regions of the West, the very Land-pikes would grunt approbation to the fine things said of the hog family. Thus reads an extract from the Report on Swine to the Hartford County [Conn.] Agricultural Society:
“The committee are admonished by the past that the subject of swine is one of peculiar delicacy, and one concerning which breeds are more likely than quadrupeds to get excited; and they will endeavor to treat all animals they have occasion to notice, with becoming gravity and due respect. Indeed, the hog is the last animal with whose feelings the committee would trifle. A fat hog has a calm and serene dignity, far surpassing that of Alderman, Bishop, or his holiness himself.
Before entering into a detail of individual merit, the Committee have to say, and they do it with peculiar pride and pleasure, that the pigs of Hartford County are far better bred, and far more moral, than those of the said and sober county of Worcester. At the last fair in Worcester the festivities of the occasion were interrupted by a sanguinary duel between two boars, and the turf on the beautiful green of Worcester was stained, not with human, but with hoggish gore. The Committee are happy to state, that no such disgraceful occurrence marred our festivities, not a provoking word was spoken, not an insulting speech was made, no challenge was given, nor duel fought. When the Committee congratulated the tenants of the pens on this subject the only response heard by the Committee was, that they were not members of Congress, accompanied by a look of surprise, that anyone should think it possible that any pig bred in Hartford County should disgrace himself by dueling. And the opinion seemed to be universal among them that neither honorable pigs, nor honorable men, [members of Congress excepted] would ever have any “affairs of honor” to settle.
Ralph R. Phelps, Ch’n.