SCIENTIFIC TAXIDERMY FOR MUSEUMS. . 417 



utterly, for he would reenact the same performance I have just described. 

 Finally I tied a pieceof strong pack thread to his leg and took him out 

 of doors, took him in the broiling glare of the sun, and giving him a 

 blotting-paper background and a pretty perch, i went at him again. 

 After numerous attempts I secured the fairly good result shown in 

 Plate lxx. When obtained he was staring his eyes out at a chicken that 

 was making a disturbance not far away, and with a pin-hole diaphragm 

 in, I gave him an exposure of at least ten seconds, during which time 

 he never moved. His right foot exhibited an old dislocation, and its 

 twisted position is evident in his picture. I am indebted to Master 

 Richard Lay, of Takoma, D. 0., for the loan of this bird, for which and 

 for his trouble in capturing it for me I desire here to express my grate- 

 ful acknowledgments. It is my intention to experiment with the pho- 

 tography of owls until I succeed in getting a tine series of them in all 

 possible poses, with the hope that when duly published they will prove 

 useful to both artist and taxidermist. On a former page I have invited 

 attention to the picture of the owl shown in Plate lxxii. It is a plate 

 made from a photograph of a drawing that was accurately copied from 

 the original photograph of the bird, and is a good result and ought to 

 prove useful both to the artist and to the taxidermist. This pluftiug up 

 of the feathers in Bubo is common practice with them, and the act, to 

 a moderate degree, has been well rendered in the exceptionally tine 

 mount of one of the bubonine owls which I offer in Plate lxxi. It 

 shows the bird in what might be called the first stage of observant 

 defiance, or when something, evidently not of a pleasing nature, has 

 attracted his attention and he is "getting on a ready" to repel it. The 

 original has but to be seen to be admired, for it is remarkably well 

 done. 



There is not much encouragement to the taxidermist if the ever pres- 

 ent tact is before him that the work with which he has taken so much 

 pains, and given so much of his labor, is at last to be but poorly exhib- 

 ited; that is, his birds are to be huddled together in small and unsuit- 

 able cases, and those in an illy-lighted hall. Unfortunately this is just 

 what exists in the ornithological department now in the old Smithson- 

 ian Institution building, where certainly 50 per cent of the room space 

 is particularly not of the proper kind wherein to exhibit birds. This 

 subject, though not altogether foreign to the present report, is in reality 

 one that should be far more extensively dealt with than I will be ena- 

 bled to do in this connection. 



Of all the departments of the art of taxidermy none can exceed, and 

 I doubt any cau quite equal, the talent required to properly preserve 

 mammals. This is due to the fact that in a vast majority of them the 

 hair is sufficiently short to exhibit the anatomical contours of the body, 

 head, and limbs, while in some the hair is practically entirely absent, 

 and this very much increases the difficulty. The proper handling of 

 the mouth and associated structures, of certain special organs, and of 

 H. Mis, 1U, pt. 2—27 



