72 SIR WILLIAM FLOWER CHAP. 



whispering in Ferdinand's ear, the transcript of 

 nature is so minute that the holes eaten by cater- 

 pillars in the chestnut leaves are carefully painted. 

 Yet in a painting of nearly the same time, " The Pot 

 of Basil," a badly-stuffed falcon, which looks as if it 

 had been straightened out in a box and then put on 

 a stand without adjustment, is perched on the back of 

 one of the young men's chairs. It is so faithfully 

 painted that any one might imagine that a stuffed 

 falcon was part of the dining-room furniture. The 

 advances made subsequently in what is practically a 

 new art owe much to his encouragement and later 

 advocacy of the necessity for true and artistic and 

 lifelike work of this kind. At the time they were 

 uttered his remarks also made a considerable 

 impression. Frank Buckland, in concluding an 

 account of the address, said : 



I should like to make one or two remarks on my own account. 

 The employment of women is one of the questions of the day, 

 and I really do not see why some of the lady students at South 

 Kensington should not study taxidermy as well as painting and 

 drawing. It is an art which requires great delicacy of touch, 

 combined with taste, and there is always a sale for well-mounted 

 objects of natural history, particularly birds. When I was a boy 

 I remember quite well that it was fashionable for ladies to make 

 wax flowers. This seems now to have quite died out, and I 

 should like to see the art of bird-stuffing taken up by some ladies. 



The demand for well-set-up specimens is now 

 very much greater than it was then, and as the skins 

 are generally obtained from the collectors before 

 they are stuffed, there is nothing unpleasant in the 



