524 PREPARATION, MOUNTING, AND COLLECTION OF OBJECTS 



Faber pencil marked H H H H. On the narrower and opposite 

 ground surface should be written what the object is mounted in, 

 how stained, or whence obtained, the date of mounting, &c. 



Xow when all this is written take thin covers, cut respectively 

 1 X J inch and 1 x \ inch, and by means of benzol balsam, applied 

 with or without heat, the ground surfaces should have these thin 

 glasses put on over the writing and the entire ground surfaces ; the 

 result of course will be that the transparency of what was a ground 

 and opaque surface will be wholly restored, and the writing will be 

 clear and ineffaceable. If the bottom of the trays of the cabinets be 

 whitened it will render still more easy the instant reading of the 

 contents of the label. 



The grinding of the slips is by no means difficult, and could not 

 be costly if there arose a demand for them. 



It is easy, however, to do all that is required. A block of wood 

 to receive the slide in an excavation of its own shape and size, and a 

 piece of wood half an inch thick, of the exact length (1J inch) 

 of the space between the labels, enables a lead ' buff ' to be freely 

 used with fine emery and the work is speedily done. Of course the 

 finer the emery the finer the surface ; and the finer the surface the 

 more delicate the writing may be made. The label may in fact be 

 as ornate and elegant as we please. Nor need we be confined to an 

 oblong shape. Oval or round spaces could be ground on the slips 

 and thin covers of corresponding size could be accordingly used. 

 This method gives a little more trouble and is slightly more 

 expensive, but in elegance and above all in durability we believe it 

 has no equal. 



For the preservation of objects, the pasteboard boxes now made 

 at a very reasonable cost, with wooden racks, to contain six, twelve, 

 or twenty-four slides, will be found extremely useful. For the 

 management of a large collection the following has proved itself to 

 be thoroughly practical, and can be universally employed. The 

 species, genus, and character of the slides may be disregarded. Place 

 the slides in the cabinet just as they come, numbering each consecu- 

 tively. The exterior of cabinets should show from what number to 

 what number the cabinet contains : thus, 527 to 842. The porcelain 

 slab on the drawer may indicate from what number to what number 

 the drawer contains : thus, 527 to 539. Now a number of note- 

 books should be procured, so that there may be a separate notebook 

 for each subject ; the size of the notebook must be regulated to the 

 importance of the special department the collector has taken up. 

 Thus a diatomist would have probably a thick ledger for his diatom 

 collection, whereas an entomologist would have a thin notebook for 

 his diatoms and a thick ledger for his insects, and so on. The note- 

 books might be distinguished from one another by a letter of the 

 alphabet. 



In the event of a second notebook being required for the same 

 subject or class of objects, it might be identified by doubling the 

 letter thus, D D. Now a large index notebook will be required in 

 which one line is given to each slide. This notebook contains 



