CLEANING AND MOUNTING SMALL SKELETONS. 289 



arrangement of its specimens, can be considered equal to this. 

 The museum-builder may well consider it a model of its kind. 

 Every skeleton, from that of a tiny humming-bird to a whale 

 forty-eight feet long, is as nearly perfect as human skill can 

 make it, and the variety of the characteristic attitudes repre- 

 sented in the smaller species makes this collection a particu- 

 larly attractive one. 



PROCESS WITH MAMMALS. We will assume that the skeleton 

 has been carefully scraped, and is now ready for mounting. 

 The successive steps in this work from start to finish are about 

 as follows : 



1. In case the skeleton has been dried after scraping, as is 

 often done, it must be soaked in clear water until the ligaments 

 are relaxed. 



2. Cut a zinc or galvanized iron wire of the right length and 

 size to replace the spinal marrow, and long enough that the 

 upper end of it will project beyond the axis into the brain 

 cavity of the skull. Sharpen one end of this wire so that you 

 can force it well down into the sacrum, and insert it in its place 

 in the spinal column. 



3. Bend the vertebral column to its permanent shape. In 

 doing this, draw the sternum well forward so that the ribs will 

 spread out, and show a chest cavity of the right size for inflated 

 lungs. If you are not careful in this regard, the chest cavity 

 will be too narrow. 



4. Hang the body in a frame made of light strips of wood, as 

 shown in the accompanying plate. Let the body hang at just 

 the right height from the pedestal to receive the legs (Plate 

 XX.). 



5. Space the ribs carefully by starting a thread from the neck, 

 and taking a turn around each rib from the first to the last, 

 finally making fast the remaining end of the thread to one of 

 the lumbar vertebrae. 



6. Put on each hind leg by drilling a small hole straight 

 through the head of the femur and the socket of the pelvis 

 (innominate bone), through which a small brass wire is to be 

 passed and clinched down closely at each end, to hold the head 

 of the femur firmly in place. 



7. Place each leg in the attitude chosen for it, plant the foot 



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