160 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 



My experience with that specimen will serve as a good illustra- 

 tion of the difficulties I had to contend with in curing skins in that 

 rainy jungle. In a cHraate that is diy and hot, skins can be cured, 

 sometimes, almost witl:out preservatives ; but in the moist and 

 hot tropics, every bit of skin which does not feel the effects of a 

 powerful preservative at the right time will simply decompose be- 

 fore it will cure in the least. When the powdered alum does not 

 reach the epidermis, the latter slips oflf in about four days, taking 

 the hair along with it, lea\ing unsightly bald patches on the skin. 

 Thick skins must be thinned down with the knife, so that the alum 

 will strike through at once to the roots of the hair, and harden the 

 whole skin. For the benefit of the sportsman and the general 

 reader, I am tempted to give brief directions for skinning a tiger, so 

 that it may be mounted as a first class-museum specimen ; for 

 which see the Appendix. We removed the skin of our tiger, ap- 

 plied the preservatives, and hung it over a pole to dry, expecting 

 that such glorious sunny weather as we were then having would 

 allow it to cure in a very few days. That same evening it began to 

 rain, and for the next ten days it was either a steady down-poiu' or 

 a dreary drizzle. Of course, no skin could dry in such a vapor 

 bath as that, and, worst of all, I was very short of alum. 



For a week I played a game with the elements, with that tiget 

 skin for a stake. I hung it out in the air whenever the rain ceased 

 for an hour ; I built a fire before it, and came near roasting one leg. 

 I had a wide shed built, near my hut, under which I hung the skin, 

 spread out and stretched so that the air could reach every portion 

 of it freely. I applied to it all the alum I had, both in the dry state 

 and made into a warm bath, but still the skin would not and could 

 not harden in the least, nor get dry so long as I remained there. 



Determined not to lose such a specimen we broke up our camp 

 hastily and hurried off half a day's march to a spot that was higher and 

 more open, and where less rain fell. There we found the sun shining, 

 not hotly by any means, and unpacking our tiger skin we spread it 

 out widely in his gracious beams, which saved it at the last moment. 



Mr. Theobald sympathized with me very heartily during my 

 troubles with it, and congratulated me upon my final success, in- 

 forming me as he did so that he had once lost two fine tiger skins 

 under similar circumstances, in spite of all he could do to save them. 



I had neai'ly the same trouble with every large mammal skin I 

 prepared in that rainy jungle, and I realized more than ever that 

 " eternal vigilance is the price of " a collection. 



