GETTING YOUR BIRDS HOME. 37 



your hands are powder-begrimed ; and besides, even the warmth 

 and moisture of your palms may tend to injure a delicate feath- 

 ering. Ordinarily pick up a bird by the feet or bill ; as you 

 need both hands to make the cornucopia, let the specimen dan- 

 gle by the toes from your teeth while you are so employed. 

 In catching at a wounded bird, aim to cover it entirely with 

 your hand : but whatever you do, never seize it b}^ the tail, which 

 then will often be left in your hands for your pains. Never 

 grasp wing tips or tail feathers ; these large flat quills would 

 get a peculiar crimping all along the webs, very difficult to 

 efface. Finally, I would add there is a certain knack or art in 

 manipulating, either of a dead bird or a birdskin, by which you 

 may handle it with seeming carelessness and perfect impunity ; 

 whilst the most gingerly fingering of an inexperienced person 

 will leave its rude trace. You will naturally acquire the cor- 

 rect touch'; but it can be neither taught nor described. 



§24. A SPECIAL CASE. While the ordinary run of land birds 

 will be brought home in good order by the foregoing method, 

 some require special precautions. I refer to seabirds, such as 

 gulls, terns, petrels, etc., shot from a boat. In the first place, 

 the plumage of most of them is, in part at least, white and of ex- 

 quisite purity. Then, fish-eating birds usually vomit and purge 

 when shot. They are necessarily fished all dripping from the 

 water. They are too large for pocketing. If you put them on 

 the thwarts or elsewhere about the boat, they usually fall off, or 

 are knocked off, into the bilge water ; if you stow them in the'" 

 cubby-hole, they will assuredly soil by mutual pressure, or by 

 rolling about. It will repay you to pick them from the water 

 by the bill, and shake off all the water j^ou can ; hold them up, 

 or let some one do it, till they are tolerably dry ; plug the 

 mouth, nostrils and vent, if not also shot-holes ; wrap each 

 one separately in a cloth (not paper) or a mass of tow, and 

 pack steadily in a covered box or basket taken on board for 

 this purpose. 



§25. Hygiene of collectorship. It is unnecessary to 



