SCIENTIFIC TAXIDERMY FOR MUSEUMS. 385 



in all the professed works on zoology and natural history, even in so good and gen- 

 erally correct a work as Brebm, are glaringly false, and it is only within the last 

 few years that anything approaching truthful representations — figures drawn from 

 observation instead of copies of previous drawings originally evolved from the artisl s 

 " inner consciousness" — have been given us, and so it happens that of mounted speci- 

 mens of the walrus showing the, true appearance of the animal almost the only ones 

 at the present time are the one at Cambridge, and that other at the United States 

 National Museum mounted by Mr. Hornaday.* 



How often has a painstaking taxidermist wished for a means of refreshing his rec- 

 ollection on some little matter of detail concerning a creature's anatomy, and been 

 obliged to finally guess at it because of the lack of adequate illustrations. Let me 

 not be understood as descrying the assistance afforded by zoological gardens. It is 

 just here that they come into play, and as it is better for the taxidermist to observe 

 at first hand, so these are even better than drawings for reference; but the. fact is 

 they are far from being readily accessible at best in this country, and in the few 

 instances in which this objection does not apply the variety of specimens which 

 they contain is too limited, so that we are still compelled to supplement them by a 

 more ready source of information, and thus we fall back upon pictorial representa- 

 tions as on the whole most convenient. As above implied, however, these represen- 

 tations must be taken from life by skillful hands, and must give us the animals as 

 they look, and not as the artist thinks they ought to look. 



But in order that we may have such we must encourage those who work in this 

 line — the Landseers, the Baryes, the Wolfs, the Spechts, etc., whom, under a change 

 of name, we have in this country in the Beards, the Kenieyses, etc. We must make 

 it profitable for them to undertake the work we so much need, and if we have the 

 good of taxidermy at heart, if we have faith in its capabilities as an art we will do 

 this, for in so doing we are helping it and ourselves as well as them. 



Iii The Auk for April, 1891, the present writer published a letter en- 

 titled " Camera notes for ornithologists," which, not being of very- 

 great length and quite in line with the views just quoted above, will, 

 I think, bear repeating here, and enlarging upon a little further along. 

 I said: 



At the last congress of the American Ornithologists' Union there were exhibited 

 many photographs of all sorts of ornithological subjects, and the majority of them 

 were examined by the. writer with great care. 



For one, I was disappointed in the results arrived at by the authors of the most 

 of them, as there appeared to be such a total absence of any practical result attained. 

 Among the best that I saw Avere some taken by Dr. Edgar A. Mearns, but even those, 

 the work of a most painstaking naturalist, did not come up to what the camera is 

 capable of performing for practical ornithology. Little or nothing is to be gained 

 in this latter direction by photographing bunches of game or badly mounted speci- 

 mens and similar subjects. Any tyro can accomplish as much as that, and orni- 

 thology not be called upon to thank him for it. 



In the present communication it is the writer's object to relate some personal 

 experiences which may be of assistance to those interested in this line of work. 



Now, in the first place, as to some of the objects to be attained: There are a num- 

 ber of these. We may desire, for example, a sharp, clear photograph, which either 

 may be natural size or may present the subject reduced, for the use of the lithog- 

 rapher, in order to place in the latter's hands an accurate figure to be copied ou to 

 stone, and the plates printed therefrom to be used for illustrative purposes. The 



* In this connection see the various figures of the walrus illustrating the present 

 report, Plates i.xxxv, i.xxxvi. 



H. Mis. 114, pt. L> 25 



