TAXIDERMY. 131 



spending to the number of the animal to which they 

 relate. 



It is essential that these numbers should not 

 be written on white paper or on parchment, 'but 

 painted in oil on a piece of wood, or metal, and 

 fastened with a brass wire, either to the skins en- 

 closed in the cases, or to the bottles and barrels 

 which contain the animals. It would be easy to 

 have numbers made with a stamp on plates of tin, 

 we should then be sure that there was no uncer- 

 tainty in the cyphers. It is also possible to have 

 plates of pewter sufficiently thin to engrave num- 

 bers on them with a steel point, and these engraved 

 plates may be attached to the animals, we put into 

 the spirit. We may also fasten to each object, 

 whether in spirits, dried, or in cases, a small piece 

 of packthread with knots : these knots must form 

 two series, separated by an interval ; the first series 

 marks the tens, the second the units : and by this 

 means we can indicate any number we please. 



We must now speak of the method of packing 

 zoological objects, so that they may arrive in 

 Europe in a good state of preservation. 



The objects which we send are either skins of 

 animals, or the animals entire in spirits. The 

 skins of animals or birds, would be attacked by 

 dermestides and similar insects, and in warm coun- 

 tries they are extremely liable to be injured, if we 

 do not take pains to preserve them. The surest 

 G 6 



