336 TAXIDERMY AND MODELLING 



wound around the base of the flower. The whitish fleshy stem 

 , is made by rolling doubled white wax around the wires to the 

 desired thickness. 



The stalk-leaves or scales are cut to shape from white 

 wax and backed by a smaller piece of green fabric, in such a 

 manner as to allow an irregular edge of white to show 

 beyond the green. Tool them up and attach to the stalk by 

 pressure. Vary these by superimposing brown fabric upon the 

 white wax, and sometimes the wax may be placed outside for 

 the sake of variety, but the natural flower will dictate this. 

 Colour their tips, etc., but observe, before finally arranging the 

 scales, whether the stalk requires more tooling, the addition of 

 more wax, or colouring. 



The leaves (radical) do not come with the flowers, and, if 

 required, must be cast (see p. 312). 



The Sea-Aster, Aster tripolium, Linn. 



This very striking and beautiful plant, flowering in 

 September, is found lining the edges of brackish-water dykes, 

 and on the salt marshes, of Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and other 

 counties. When growing in the ditches, pools, and dykes, 

 where the salt water occasionally or but rarely gains access, so 

 that the water is brackish or but slightly impregnated with salt, 

 it grows from 3 to 4 feet in height, much branched, each 

 branch and the top of the main stem carrying a profusion of 

 yellow-centred lilac flowers, which brighten up the water-courses 

 with a broad belt of pleasing colour for hundreds of yards in 

 length ; the main stems, which are of some thickness, are of a 

 fine red, and the leaves, except at the bottom of the plant, are 

 somewhat thin and lanceolate. On the salt marshes — where it 

 grows close to the sand, or at normal high -water mark, and 

 forms broad belts or meadows of colour and verdure for miles, — 

 it assumes a more stunted and less branched form, the main 



