MAMMALS SET UP BY ORDINARY METHODS 115 



each secure. This operation will no doubt necessitate the 

 lower part of the artificial body being out of the skin whilst 

 being done. This being reinserted, place the wires of the hind 

 limbs in their corresponding loops, and make fast in the same 

 manner. Cut off what superfluous wire may have been left 

 at the tail end, which part, in the case of a rabbit, can easily 

 be adjusted afterwards by a fine wire, but, in a longer-tailed 

 mammal, this wire may, unless another wire be also used, be 

 left long enough to go up into the tail. The rabbit is now 

 somewhat in a spread-eagle condition, and therefore the limbs 

 must be brought down to the sides in their proper position and 

 roughly shaped to the attitudes desired. The body will now 

 be too small in parts, but that is better than having made it 

 too large by overstuffing at first, as more tow can easily be 

 added where it cannot be so well taken away, and, when near- 

 ing completion, a little clay placed within over the tow in 

 various positions will help the final modelling of the thinner 

 portions, care being taken to shape each part as the work pro- 

 gresses. Sew up the skin, and, when the legs are fixed upon 

 a board, through which their wires should be bolted, the head, 

 which during all these processes has suffered considerable 

 derangement, may be pricked out with a fine needle and the 

 fine awl No. 26, and more clay added or taken away through 

 the orbits as the modelling demands. The eyes may either be 

 introduced now or left till later — when any imperfections may be 

 made up through the orbits, — whilst, through the orifice of the 

 ears, the modelling of the back of the head may be improved 

 by pushing in wadding and clay, and finally, the ears should 

 either have the two extra pieces of card bound lightly within them, 

 shaped so as to fit the contours of the cards inside, and be 

 bent into position, or, better still, their hollows filled with clay, 

 and a long pin or two or fine wire driven through the base of 

 the ear will hold each in position. The most effectual method, 



