THE ZOOLOGIST. 
THIRD SERIES. 
Vou. I.] NOVEMBER, 1877. [No. 11. 
ON THE PREPARATION OF SKELETONS FOR MUSEUM 
PURPOSES.* i 
By Proressor W. H. Fiower, F.R.S. 
EveryYonrE who has a museum, however small, should be familiar 
with the mode of preparing skeletons. I can only indicate the 
outlines of the process, for in this, as in every other part of the work 
of making anatomical preparations, a few practical lessons from a 
person already an adept, and a little experience and observation, 
will do more than any description. When the principles are known, 
the details can be carried out with such modifications and improve- 
ments for each individual case as the skill and ingenuity of the 
operator can suggest. With regard to museum specimens generally, 
the question is frequently asked how such or such a preparation is 
made, and an answer is expected, in a few words, which will 
enable the questioner to do the same himself. This is much as if 
a novice who had never handled a brush were to ask an artist how 
he had painted his picture, and expect that a few simple directions 
would put him on a level with the master. Preparation-making is 
an art which can only be acquired by labour and perseverance, 
superadded to some natural qualifications not possessed in an equal 
degree by all. 
To return to the bones, as in many respects the simplest kind of 
preparations. There is a popular notion that skeletons are made 
by putting animals into ant-hills. So I have been told over and 
over again ever since I was a child. I must, however, say that 
* From a Lecture delivered at the Loan Collection of Scientific Apparatus, 
South Kensington. 
30 
