Mounted Birds in Illustration 



Editor of Bird -Lore : 



My Dear Sir — The use of photographs of stuffed birds as illustrations 

 in bird -books has become an insidious stumbling-block in the path of those 

 you are trying to lead to see the beauty of life in all its forms, and an 

 affliction to the more intimate bird-lovers, especially to such as have a more 

 than usually developed sight sense. 



The fact that the average bird -student cannot tell the difference 

 between a photograph of a live bird and one from a skilfully mounted skin is 

 all the more reason against the use of the latter; since he needs protection 

 from deception. In fact, we agree that beginners in all fields should be 

 be fed, mentally, on the purest food. 



The camera gives us, as by miracle. Life, manifest in the thousand 

 exquisite details of the bird's appearance, and utterly unachievable save 

 by the creature's spontaneous self- adjustment. And now that we have 

 tasted this feast for the mind and the eye, the possibility of looking un- 

 pained at the mummy picture is gone. 



To the seeing few, such pictures are exactly as depressing as similar 

 reproductions of human mummies would be. While the mind may be 

 acquiring from them some facts about birds' markings, etc., the heart is 

 feeling something of the horror one would feel at a corpse. Surely the 

 dullest -sighted bird -student must ultimately grow to see their more than 

 corpse -like ugliness. In fact, a dead body has still its anatomical structure, 

 not imitable by wire and cotton wadding. 



Since Nature and Beauty are infinite, a photograph of a live, free 

 animal, or of a true artist's picture of the animal, will grow forever upon 

 the observer; while one of those horrible "fakes" charms, at best, only 

 for an instant, and then looks steadily worse and worse; as one's ac- 

 quaintance grows. 



Life is so the whole thing for us that, even where a marvel of taxi- 

 dermy cheats us for a moment, the ghastly death fact, once out, spoils 

 all enjoyment. 



An artist's picture of the same animal drawn from life might be no 

 truer in action, and yet not pain one by the false claim made by the actual 

 surface, the hair, claws, etc., preserved in taxidermy. The lasting effect 

 of the artist's picture upon the beholder would be ii/e/ while of the taxi- 

 dermist's, it would be death. Taxidermy itself, even with all its ugliness, 

 is free at least from deception ; since it cannot give motion to its pro- 

 ductions. The actual animal would move, the stuffed one does not. But 

 a picture of the latter has no such guarantee against deception. 



Of course, if a great figure -painter chanced to have, instead of his 

 human figure gift, a similar one for animal or bird painting, he would 



(28) 



