“WHEN AUGUSTUS CAME OUT on the porch the blue pigs were eating a rattlesnake—not a very big one. It had probably just been crawling around looking for shade when it ran into the pigs. They were having a fine tug-of-war with it, and its rattling days were over.”

“Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

“In one scene, when I was supposed to say, "In a pig's eye you are," what came out was, "In a pig's ass you are." Old habits die awfully hard.”

“I wait, washed, brushed, fed, like a prize pig. Sometime in the eighties they invented pig balls, for pigs who were being fattened in pens. Pig balls were large colored balls; the pigs rolled them around with their snouts. The pig marketers said this improved their muscle tone; the pigs were curious, they liked having something to think about. I read about that in Introduction to Psychology; that, and the chapter on caged rats who'd give themselves electric shocks for something to do. And the one on the pigeons trained to peck a button that made a grain of corn appear. Three groups of them: the first one got one grain per peck, the second one grain every other peck, the third was random. When the man in charge cut off the grain, the first group gave up quite soon, the second group a little later. The third group never gave up. They'd peck themselves to death, rather than quit. Who knew what worked?I wish I had a pig ball.”

“There once was a brown horse that was brown like a bean, and he lived in the home of a very poor farmer. And the poor farmer had a very poor wife, and they had a very thin chicken and a lame little pig. And so, one day the very poor farmer s wife said: We have nothing more to eat because we are very poor, so we must eat the very thin chicken. So they killed the very thin chicken and made a thin soup and ate it. And so, for a while, they were fine; but the hunger returned and the very poor farmer told his very poor wife: We have nothing more to eat because we are so poor, so we must eat the lame little pig. And so the lame little pig s turn came and they killed it and they made a lame soup and ate it. And then it was the bean-brown horse s turn. But the bean-brown horse did not wait for the story to end; it just ran away and went to another story.Is that the end of the story? I asked Durito, unable to hide my bewilderment. Of course not. Didn't you hear me say that the bean-brown horse fled to another story? he said as he prepared to leave. And so? I ask exasperated. And so nothing you have to look for the bean-brown horse in another story! he said, adjusting his hat. But, Durito! I said, protesting uselessly. Not one more word! You tell the story like it is”

“It's called a sea anchor,' [Evanlyn] explained. 'It'll stop us drifting too far.'Alyss was impressed. 'And you said you were pig-ignorant when it came to boats.''I don't remember saying that,' Evanlyn replied with a frown.Alyss shrugged. 'Oh? Well, it must have been me.”