2A.2 Correspondence. [April 



the opening. Next you decide whether or no you desire it to throw a 

 shadow; if jou do you simply fasten it to the blotting paper with a small 

 piece of soft wax, exposing to the camera the side you wish represented. 

 If you do not, you insert a piece of wire a few inches long into the board, 

 and perpendicular to it, and fasten the egg to the end of it with a soft 

 piece of wax. Place a bucket of water on the floor under the ^^^, in case 

 the specimen shoidd accidenlly drop off". Focus the egg natural size and 

 s/iarp on tlie ground-glass of your camera; this may be ascertained by a 

 ]iair of calipers, comparing the actual length of the egg with its image 

 upon the ground-glass. Insert your smallest diaphragm, and expose, — 

 the time of exposure being governed by your former experiences. I pre- 

 fer Seed's dry plates. They give excellent results. After developing, 

 unless you get a very strong negative, it is always best to intensify your 

 plate, and this is done by the usual mercury and ammonia process. Now 

 if you wish an uncolored figure, to be lithographed, or woodcut, or for 

 some of the special processes, you must print on the best ready sensitized 

 albumen paper, toning the print handsomely afterwards. On the other 

 hand if you desire a colored figure you must print on plain, /. e., non- 

 albuinenized, sensitized paper, and afterwards color the print by hand 

 with Newton's water-colors from the specimen. Pure white eggs stand 

 out well when photographed against black velvet or crape; this also 

 applies to some skulls and other osteological specimens, when they are 

 cleaned to a state of glistening whiteness. Such a procedure defines the 

 outlines well for the engraver. 



When we come to the photographing of birds, living VwA?,, for the pur- 

 pose of obtaining \.h.e proper kind of figures that can be used for the vari- 

 ous methods of reproduction now in vogue, we enter upon a field where 

 one can display no end of patience, tact and ingenuity. It will be a long 

 day before the writer will forget his experience in obtaining a photograph 

 of a live Screech Owl. Three times I walked half a mile from the house 

 where I could get a sky background for him on the summit of a hill, 

 where an old natural stump was also to be found to serve as a perch for 

 him. Just as good a result can be obtained by photographing your bird 

 in your studio with a sheet for a background, and then you may choose 

 any kind of perch you desire, from a museum T, to the limb of a rugged 

 old pine with the cones and spines on. Right here, however, I desire to 

 mention a process, no doubt already known to many, for which there is 

 no end of use. Say you have obtained a fine, intensified negative, the 

 subject being a bird caught in the act of some habit peculiar to it. You 

 wish to obtain a good, strong, accurate outline figure of it, from which 

 an electrotype can at once be made, to serve as an illustration for some 

 article upon which you may be engaged. Make a print from the plate 

 upon plain, non-albuminized, sensitized paper. Remove the print to the 

 dark-room and wash out the silver from it thoroughly. You may tone, 

 but it is not absolutely necessary unless there is very considerable detail 

 in 3'our figure. Dry the print in the dark, and keep in a perfectly dark 

 place until evening. When evening comes complete your work under a 



