300 MUSEUMS. 
of a calf in addition to them, I will-engage to make 
you a better elephant.” This unlucky and off-hand 
proposal. was within an ace of getting me into 
trouble. The sages of the establishment took cogni- 
sance of it at one of their meetings; and somebody 
proposed that a written reprimand should /be sent 
tome. However, a prudent voice in the“assembly 
caused their wrath to subside, and smiles played 
, once more over their hitherto benign countenances. 
\ I have occasionally noticed the defective manner 
in which birds are stuffed for museums. At present, 
I will confine myself solely to quadrupeds ; and, in 
my remarks on the very inferior way in which they 
are preserved, I beg to declare that I make no al- 
lusions whatever to any one museum in particular, 
It may be said with great truth that, from Rome 
to Russia, and from Orkney to Africa, there is not 
to be found, in any cabinet of natural history, one 
single quadruped which has been stuffed, or pre- 
pared, or mounted (as the French term it), upon 
scientific principles. Hence, every specimen through- 
out the whole of them must be wrong at every point. 
Horace, in giving instructions to poets, tells 
them how he would have different personages repre- 
sented. Let Medea, says he, be savage and uncon- 
querable; let Ino be in tears ; let Ixion be perfidious ; 
let Io be vagrant; and let Orestes be in sorrow :— 
«“ Sit Medea ferox invictaque, flebilis Ino, 
Perfidus Ixion, Io vaga, tristis Orestes.” 
Now, should I call upon any one of those, who have 
given to the public a mode of preserving specimens 
for museums, to step forward and show me how to 
