64- TAXIDERMY. 



Those employed in the zoological laboratory at 

 the Museum, when they first arrived, were accus- 

 tomed to put the wire in before they stuffed the 

 neck, but they have all now renounced this method, 

 and prefer that we have just described. . More than 

 2000 birds, in the number of those which now or- 

 nament the galleries of the Museum, have been 

 mounted in this way. 



Besides these two methods, Mange had a third, 

 peculiar to himself. When he had a wire of a size 

 proportioned to the bird he was going to mount, 

 he took two pieces of it, the one a little longer than 

 the other ; he pointed both ends of the longest 

 piece, and one only of the shortest. We suppose 

 the bird to be a small one. He held one end of 

 each wire under the left thumb and fore-finger ; at 

 about the distance of two-thirds of an inch he 

 twisted the other parts five or six times with the 

 same fingers of the right hand ; after which he left 

 a space untwisted large enough for a finger to pass 

 through ; he continued to twist it four or five turns, 

 leaving a second interval untwisted, for the passage 

 of the two wires of the claws, and giving the form 

 of a triangle to the first space which he had re- 

 served; we conceive that the smaller opening or 

 second distance ought to be one turn above the 

 triangle. 



The two wires for the claws are, as usual, straight 

 and pointed at one end. To fix the centre wire, 



