Chapter 5

CHAPTER V.

Mr. Wimbush had taken them to see the sights of the Home Farm,
and now they were standing, all six of them--Henry Wimbush, Mr.
Scogan, Denis, Gombauld, Anne, and Mary--by the low wall of the
piggery, looking into one of the styes.

"This is a good sow," said Henry Wimbush. "She had a litter of
fourteen.

"Fourteen?" Mary echoed incredulously. She turned astonished
blue eyes towards Mr. Wimbush, then let them fall onto the
seething mass of elan vital that fermented in the sty.

An immense sow reposed on her side in the middle of the pen. Her
round, black belly, fringed with a double line of dugs, presented
itself to the assault of an army of small, brownish-black swine.
With a frantic greed they tugged at their mother's flank. The
old sow stirred sometimes uneasily or uttered a little grunt of
pain. One small pig, the runt, the weakling of the litter, had
been unable to secure a place at the banquet. Squealing shrilly,
he ran backwards and forwards, trying to push in among his
stronger brothers or even to climb over their tight little black
backs towards the maternal reservoir.

"There ARE fourteen," said Mary. "You're quite right. I
counted. It's extraordinary."

"The sow next door," Mr. Wimbush went on, "has done very badly.
She only had five in her litter. I shall give her another
chance. If she does no better next time, I shall fat her up and
kill her. There's the boar," he pointed towards a farther sty.
"Fine old beast, isn't he? But he's getting past his prime.
He'll have to go too."

"How cruel!" Anne exclaimed.

"But how practical, how eminently realistic!" said Mr. Scogan.
"In this farm we have a model of sound paternal government. Make
them breed, make them work, and when they're past working or
breeding or begetting, slaughter them."

"Farming seems to be mostly indecency and cruelty," said Anne.

With the ferrule of his walking-stick Denis began to scratch the
boar's long bristly back. The animal moved a little so as to
bring himself within easier range of the instrument that evoked
in him such delicious sensations; then he stood stock still,
softly grunting his contentment. The mud of years flaked off his
sides in a grey powdery scurf.

"What a pleasure it is," said Denis, "to do somebody a kindness.
I believe I enjoy scratching this pig quite as much as he enjoys
being scratched. If only one could always be kind with so little
expense or trouble..."

A gate slammed; there was a sound of heavy footsteps.

"Morning, Rowley!" said Henry Wimbush.

"Morning, sir," old Rowley answered. He was the most venerable
of the labourers on the farm--a tall, solid man, still unbent,
with grey