Arthur Hoggett

"That'll do, Pig. That'll do."

- Arthur Hogget to Babe

Arthur Hoggett is the main human progagonist of the 1995 acclaimed family film Babe.

He is a shy sheepherder who finds an unusual use in the pig he wins.He is played by James Cromwell.

Role
Hoggett is an acclaimed Sheepherder who wins Babe the pig at a fair (guessing how much he ways) and brings him home and allows him to stay with a Border Collie named Fly, her tempermental mate, Rex. There the Pig starts getting an ever expanding interest in sheep herding.

Christmas brings a visit from the Hoggetts' relatives. Babe is almost chosen for Christmas dinnerbut a duck is picked instead after Arthur remarks to his wife, Esme, that Babe may bring a prize for ham at the next county fair. On Christmas Day, Babe justifies his existence by alerting Arthur to sheep rustlers stealing sheep from one of the fields who immediately depart. The next day, Arthur sees Babe sort the hens, separating the brown ones from the white ones. Impressed, he takes him to the fields and allows him to try and herd the sheep. Encouraged by an elder ewe named Maa whom he had met previously on the farm, the sheep cooperate, but Rex sees Babe's actions as an insult to sheepdogs and confronts Fly in a vicious fight for encouraging Babe. He injures her leg and accidentally bites Arthur's right hand when he tries to intervene. Rex is then chained to the dog house, muzzled, and sedated, leaving the sheepherding job to Babe.

One morning, Babe is awakened by the sheep's cries and sees three feral dogs attacking them. Despite managing to scare them off, Maa is mortally injured and dies as a result. Arthur arrives, thinking that Babe killed her because he has blood on his snout when he had nuzzled her, prepares to shoot him for doing so. Fly is so anxious to find out whether he is guilty or innocent that, for the first time in her life, instead of barking orders at the sheep, talks to them to find out what happened. They tell her that he is innocent and saved them. She barks to distract Arthur from shooting him, delaying him until Esme intervenes and mentions that feral dogs have been killing sheep on neighboring farms, whereupon he realizes that Babe was innocent.

When Esme leaves on a trip, Arthur signs Babe up for a local sheepherding competition. The night before, it is raining, so Arthur lets him and Fly in the house. However, Duchess scratches him when he tries to speak to her, so Arthur immediately confines her outside. When she comes back inside later, she gets revenge on Babe by revealing that humans eat pigs. Horrified, he runs out to the barn and learns from Fly that this is true.

The next morning, Fly discovers that Babe has run away. She and Rex alert Arthur, and they all search for him. Rex finds him in a cemetery and Arthur brings him home. However, he is still demoralized by Duchess' story and refuses to eat, despite encouragement from Rex, who has softened his attitude towards him. Arthur gives him a drink from a baby bottle, sings "If I Had Words" to him, and dances a jig for him. This restores his faith in Arthur's affection, and he begins eating again.

Later, at the competition, Babe meets the sheep that he will be herding, but they ignore his attempts to speak to them. As Arthur is criticized by the bemused judges and ridiculed by the public for using a pig instead of a dog, Rex immediately runs back to the farm to ask the sheep what to do. They give him a secret password ("Baa-ram-ewe"), first extracting a promise from him that he will treat them better from now on. He returns in time and conveys the password to Babe. When he recites it to the sheep, they follow his instructions flawlessly and he is wildly acclaimed by the crowd and unanimously given the highest score. He sits next to Arthur, who praises him, in his understated way, by saying, "That'll do, Pig. That'll do."