passed was grubbed up in all directions
with furrows made by these animals, so that the soil had all the
appearance of having been ploughed up.

Burckhardt mentions the occurrence of the wild boar and panther
together, or the _ounce_, as he calls it, on the mountain of Rieha, and
also in the wooded part of Tabor. He mentions "a common saying and
belief among the Turks, that all the animal kingdom was converted by
their prophet to the true faith, except the wild boar and buffalo, which
remained unbelievers; it is on this account that both these animals are
often called Christians. We are not surprised that the boar should be so
denominated; but as the flesh of the buffalo, as well as its Leben or
sour milk, is much esteemed by the Turks, it is difficult to account for
the disgrace into which that animal has fallen among them; the only
reason I could learn for it is, that the buffalo, like the hog, has a
habit of rolling in the mud, and of plunging into the muddy ponds in the
summer time up to the very nose, which alone remains visible above the
surface."[198] Wild boars were frequently fallen in with by this
traveller during his Syrian travels in the neighbourhood of rush-covered
springs, where they could easily return to their "wallowing in the
mire;" he also met with them on all the mountains he visited in his
tour. In the Ghor they are very abundant, and so injurious to the Arabs
of that valley that they are unable to cultivate the common barley on
account of the eagerness with which the wild swine feed on it, and are
obliged to grow a less esteemed kind, with six rows of grains which the
swine will not touch.

Messrs Hemprich and Ehrenberg tell us that the wild boar is far
from scarce in the marshy districts around Rosetta and Damietta, and
that it does not seem to differ from the European species. The head of a
wild boar which these travellers saw at Bischerre, a village of Lebanon,
closely resembled the European variety, except in being a little longer.
The Maronites there, who ate its flesh in their company, called it
_chansir_,[199] a name evidently identical with the Hebrew word
_chasir_, which occurs in the Bible. The Turks, according to Ehrenberg,
keep swine in their stables, from a persuasion that all devils who may
enter will be more likely to go into the pigs than the horses, from
their alliance to the former unclean animals.--_A. White, in
"Excelsior."_

[Illustration: The River Pig.]

THE RIVER PIG