308 MUSEUMS. 
eyes with a little putty or wax. The slit, if properly 
done, will leave no mark on the fur. 
If the quadruped be stuffed in distant countries, 
with an intention to be sent home, it may be cut 
up, when finished, into three or four separate pieces, 
and this will facilitate the carriage. When dividing 
it, the operator must take care to hold his knife so 
as to humour the angle which the fur forms with 
the skin. Thus, were I to cut a preserved skin in 
two parts, the blade of my knife would point to the 
head, and the haft to the tail of the animal. By 
attention to this, not a hair of the fur will be cut 
during the operation. 
I will just add here (although it be a digression), 
that there is no difficulty in making the legs and 
feet of eagles, turkeys, and other large birds, retain 
their natural size. You may go through every 
known museum, and you will find that the legs of 
these, and of all large birds, are dried and shrivelled, 
as though they belonged to the mummies of ancient 
days. In order to give the legs of birds a natural 
appearance, and a natural size, the skin, from the 
very claws to the top of the leg, must be separated 
from the bone by running a working-iron betwixt 
it and the bone, and then modelling the skin with 
the working-iron. 
The wattles of fowls, the caruncles of turkeys, 
-and the combs of cocks, by the simple process of 
internal modelling, may be made to retain their 
natural size. 
I have now given an outline of the mode of pre- 
serving quadrupeds upon scientific principles. Here, 
