REPORT OF NATIONAL, MUSEUM, IS^l. 61 



gone a wonderful transformation from the time Mr. Hornaday, as 

 chief taxidermist of the National Museum, and his colleagues intro- 

 duced modern ideas into the craft. By their knowledge of the living 

 animals and improved technique, the National Museum achieved 

 foremost rank, and a large number of lifelike mounts in the collec- 

 tion still testify to their skill and artistic sense. Naturally, how- 

 ever, not all the specimens from that time claim to be first class, and 

 there is evident a tendency to exaggerate the bulk of many animals. 

 Reacting against this tendency, the next generation of taxidermists 

 went to the other extreme, by only considering the bony structure 

 of the animals, with the result that quite a number of prominent 

 specimens look as if the skins had been stretched over the dry 

 skeleton without reference to the soft tissues and organs. Obviously 

 the ideal method of mounting a skin of a dead animal is to model 

 the body from a living specimen of the same species. When it was 

 decided to remount an African leopard in the exhibition series, 

 which, though being of average quality, showed certain obvious de- 

 fects when compared with a living leopard at the National Zoolog- 

 ical Park, arrangements were made with the superintendent, Mr. 

 N. Hollister, to allow Mr. W. L. Brown, the taxidermist, to work at 

 the park in front of the leopard case. The skin was stripped from 

 the old manikin and tanned, and then the necessary alterations made 

 as the living animal posed before the taxidermist. The experiment 

 was highly successful, with the result that, instead of an indifferent 

 specimen, there has now been placed on exhibition a lifelike leopard 

 showing all the characteristics of this graceful, yet ferocious cat. 

 In addition to this, a number of new mammals have been incorpo- 

 rated in the show collection during the year. As Mr. Hoy's Aus- 

 tralian expedition has supplied a number of fine mountable skins 

 representing the unique characteristics of the fauna of that far-away 

 continent, a beginning has been made to renovate the entire Aus- 

 tralian mammal exhibit. 



In my last annual report I called attention to the fact that the 

 closing of the north and west ranges on the second floor had made 

 it necessary to display the miscellaneous collection of the animals 

 of the District of Columbia in the whale hall. The insistence of 

 the public to see at least part of the mounted insect collection made 

 it desirable to further add to the heterogenous character of the ex- 

 hibits in that hall, by installing there five slide screens holding 80 

 unit trays of insects, displaying many striking forms from various 

 countries. When the splendid J. P. Iddings collection of butterflies 

 and moths, nearly all beautifully displayed in Riker mounts, was 

 given to the museum it was found expedient to install it, tempo- 

 rarily at least, in a couple of specially constructed cabinets so ar- 

 ranged that the visiting public could themselves pull out the 



