56 FLAMINGO. 
ORDER XIII—GRALLATORES. 
This order consists of birds which frequent the sea-shore, 
margins of lakes and rivers, feeding on fish, worms, &c, In 
stuffing, they must necessarily always be placed in standing or 
walking postures. They walk with a slow and measured step. 
Many of them enter the water without swimming, and hence 
sheir designation, Waders. As we recommended in the Vulture 
| tribe, the tarsi must be opened, and the tendons taken away 
_ to prevent putridity, to which they are very liable. 
Birds of this order must be placed on flat boards, or circles 
of wood turned for the purpose. Their skins are of a very 
greasy nature, and require to be particularly well primed with 
the arsenical soap, and after they have absorbed this, with the 
solution of corrosive sublimate. We must particularly notice 
THE FLAMINGO.—Phenicopterus ruber. 
This bird is one of those, whose head cannot be passed with- 
in the skin of the neck during the operation of skinning, so 
_ that a different mode of treatment becomes necessary. When 
| obstacles of this nature come in our way, we must, in the first 
place, bare the neck as high as possible, by introducing the 
_ scalpel-handle betwixt the skull and the skin. The neck is 
then cut off as high as we can reach, and the skin pulled 
straight while it is yet soft. It now becomes necessary to make 
an incision behind the head, by which to remove the remaining 
vertebra and the brain of the bird; the skin must be laid back 
to the right and left, and cut as low as the first vertebra. The 
occipital hole is then enlarged, that we may more easily extract 
the brain; and the eyes are taken out by the same opening. 
The orifice is then sewed up with very fine stitches, taking 
care to separate the feathers at every stitch. 
The wire of the neck must be placed before the stuffing is 
commenced. The other parts are stuffed in the ordinary way. 
The leg-wires are next put in. The bone of the tarsus is 
pierced near the heels with a triangular bodkin (plate VI., fig. 
8). The point of the leg-wire is now introduced into the per- 
foration. When the point has reached the knee-joint, we must 
