MOUNTING LARGE BIUDS. 193 



the pedestal, with a ghastly section of it exposed to view. N<> 

 matter how you manage it, the iron must follow the bones of 

 the foot until it reaches the toes, and t Jen it can be bent down 

 to a perpendicular line and passed through the pedestal, alicayn 

 out of , sight. 



In all but the largest birds, the leg- wires are fastened in the 

 body in precisely the same way as described and illustrated in 

 the previous chapter, except that it requires stouter pliers and 

 more strength to bend them and clinch them firmly in the body. 

 In inserting the leg- wires in the artificial body, be sure to enter 

 them about the middle of the body, on each side, and not near 

 the tail, as nearly all beginners are prone to do. This is by all 

 odds the commonest and worst fault in mounted birds that fall 

 short of perfection. It arises from the fact that the beginner 

 makes the mistake of entering the leg-wires at the same point 

 where the bird's humerus joins the pelvis, which is too far back 

 by just one-third of the length of the entire body ! The hume- 

 rus is not represented on your wire at all, and the wire should 

 enter the body precisely where the knee-joint comes in the Uriny 

 bird. The flesh and bone of the thigh is made up (or should be, 

 at least) on the artificial body, not on your leg-wire. Lay out a 

 dead bird in a walking attitude, or study a skeleton (see Fig. 

 70), and see where the knee-joint comes ; then you will never 

 again be in danger of spoiling a bird by making its legs come 

 out from under its tail. 



In mounting large birds, the sizes of the wires I have used were 

 a,s follows : Great horned owl, No. 8 or 9 ; bald eagle, No. 7 or 8 ; 

 peacock, No. 7 ; great blue heron, No. 6 ; sandhill crane, No. 5. 



An ostrich or emu requires a manikin constructed on the same 

 principles as that built for the tiger, except that each leg rod 

 should have two iron squares instead of one. The upper ex- 

 tivmity of the log-rod is clamped tightly to one square, with two 

 nuts, as usual ; but in addition to this there should be a second 

 square with a hole in its short arm large enough for the smooth 

 rod to slip through, and this should be screwed to the body 

 board as low down as the anatomy of the bird will alloxv. The 

 object of this second iron is to prevent the bipedal specimen 

 from swaying and leaning over, as it would otherwise be very 

 apt to do. 



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