ll,"
exclaimed Hook, glancing at the mess on the table, "you have done more;
instead of one pig, you have made a _litter_."[209]

Hook, we may add, was an original wit. He did not, like most professed
wits, study his sayings before, and arrange with his seeming opponent
for an imaginary war of words. He was an _impromptu_ wit.

JESTS ABOUT SWINE.

Lord Chancellor Hardwicke's bailiff, having been ordered by his lady to
procure a sow of a particular description, came one day into the
dining-room when full of company, proclaiming with a burst of joy he
could not suppress--"I have been at Royston Fair, my lady, and I have
got a sow exactly of _your ladyship's_ size."[210]

* * * * *

John was thought to be very stupid. He was sent to a mill one day, and
the miller said--"John, some people say you are a fool! Now, tell me,
what you do know, and what you don't know."--"Well," replied John, "I
know millers' hogs are fat!"--"Yes, that's well, John; now, what don't
you know?"--"I don't know _whose corn_ fats 'em."[211]

PIGS AND SILVER SPOON.

The Earl of P---- kept a number of swine at his seat in Wiltshire, and
crossing the yard one day, he was surprised to see the pigs gathered
round one trough, and making a great noise. Curiosity prompted him to
see what was the cause, and on looking into the trough he perceived a
large silver spoon. A servant-maid came out, and began to abuse the pigs
for crying so. "Well they may," said his lordship, "when they have got
but one _silver spoon_ among them all."

* * * * *

We have heard of one nobleman in Strathearn, who, when a young man, used
to be thus addressed by his mother--"William! how are the children _and
your pigs_?"[212]

SYDNEY SMITH ON BEAUTIFUL PIGS.

DEFINITION OF BEAUTY BY A UTILITARIAN.

"Go to the Duke of Bedford's piggery at Woburn, and you will see a breed
of pigs with legs so short, that their stomachs trail upon the ground;
a breed of animals entombed in their own fat, overwhelmed with
prosperity, success, and farina. No animal could possibly be so
disgusting, if it were not useful; but a breeder who has accurately
attended to the small quantity of food it requires to swell this pig out
to such extraordinary dimensions,--the extraordinary genius it displays
for obesity,--and the laudable propensity of the flesh to desert the
cheap regions of the body, and to agglomerate on those parts wh