NATURE PICTURES.' 



By A. Radclyffe Dugmore.^ 



While book-illustrating has changed continually since printing was 

 first discovered, the greatest improvement has been made in pictures 

 of birds and animals. It is largely to the camera that we owe this 

 great improvement. The accomi^anying illustration of a stormy petrel 

 is a somewhat grotesque but yet a good example of the earlier work 

 of the ornithological artist. It is reproduced from The Natural 

 History of Birds, by Count de Bufi'on. printed in England in 1798. 

 Until quite recently only drawings were used for illustrations, and 

 with subjects such as birds ''the personal equation'' played so promi- 

 nent a part that one felt a certain sense of doubt as to the accuracy 

 even of fairly good drawings. 



For my own part I had never been satisfied with drawings of birds; 

 and therefore, giving up the pencil, I followed in the footsteps of 

 those who were experimenting with bird photography. All my earlier 

 attempts were with mounted specimens, at first without any accesso- 

 ries. But the photographs seemed hard and unlifelike. Then I tried 

 placing the mounted bird in natural surroundings, either out of doors 

 or beneath a skylight. The pictures were fairly satisfactory, but still 

 there was no disguising the fact that the bird was mounted. The 

 eyes, and usually the legs, told the stor3\ The pictures were unsym- 

 pathetic; it was as though one had photographed the wax model of a 

 friend. The likeness was there, but the life was lacking. And there 

 was another objection; although to the casual observer the specimen 

 may appear well mounted, how rarely is shown the characteristic pose 

 so subtle and delicate in its infinite variety. But few taxidermists are 

 naturalists, and without endless study of living Inrds how can anyone 

 expect to know the attitudes assumed by the difierent species ( The 



1 Copyright, 1900, by Doubleday, Page & Co. Reprinted, by permission, from The 

 Worlds Work, November, 1900. 



*It is hardly necessary to tell anyone who looks at Mr. Dugmore's picture;^ repro- 

 duced here that they are all photographed from live birds. Many are wild birds 

 taken in the woods with "snap shots," by liard work and good luck, a.« explainetl by 



the author. 



5U< 



