106 TAXIDERMY AND ZOOLOGICAL COLLECTING. 



" made up." If you can not have a real skull with genuine 

 teeth in it, for whatever mammal you are mounting 1 , no one has 

 any right to require that it be mounted with open mouth, unless 

 the head is to go on a rug instead of a scientific specimen. 

 Observe the following precautions in making a skull : 



1. Be sure that it has the proper facial angle. 



2. Be sure that it is in no way too large. Better have it too 

 small than too large. 



3. Be sure that there are no sharp corners upon it anywhere, lest 

 they come out next to the skin in mounting, and cause trouble. 



When a skull is finished, bore a hole (or two in some cases) 

 through it from the occiput to the centre of the nose or mouth, 

 for the passage of the neck irons or wires that are to support 

 the head. 



The principles involved in carving skulls apply equally to 

 carving leg bones, except in this work there is much to be done 

 with the draw-shave and spoke-shave. Of course they require 

 to be wired together at the joints, with two wires at each joint, 

 so that the space between them may be channelled out with a 

 gouge to receive the leg iron. 



SEWING UP HOLES IN SKINS. After thoroughly cleaning a skin, 

 take a glover's three-cornered needle of the proper size, and a 

 waxed thread from a ball of strong linen thread, or " gilliug 

 twine," and sew up all the holes that are to be found in the skin. 

 It requires some little ingenuity sometimes to know just how to 

 trim the edges of a hole so that it can be sewed up without puck- 

 ering the skin, but a little experimenting will soon reveal the way. 



If you have to sew up a cut which has no hair to cover it, sew 

 tightly with a curve-pointed needle, starting the stitches on the 

 inside well back from the edge, and sewing only three-quarters 

 of the way through the skin. Draw the edges tightly together. 

 When the sewing is finished, place a flat bar of iron or wood 

 underneath the seam, and hammer it with a hammer all the way 

 along. This will flatten the ridge formed by the sewing, and 

 will render the seam afmost invisible. 



In order to do fine work, a taxidermist must be quite expert 

 in the use of the needle and thread. In sewing up skins there 

 are two points to be aimed at, viz. : 



1. To sew strongly. 



