THE MAKING OF ROCK WORK 381 



such as may be got from the beds of large rivers. In the 

 Midlands, the Trent sand is celebrated for this quality, and 

 some marine sands may also be used, but they must be washed 

 in fresh water and dried many times to free them from every 

 trace of salt, as, indeed, must all marine shells, weeds, pieces of 

 wrack, or the like, introduced into cases. The sand is retained, 

 whether upon wood or rockwork, by means of thin glue, and, 

 should there be any difficulty in getting the first coat to cover, 

 the sand must be well rubbed in, or otherwise another coat of 

 glue and sand must follow the first when dry. In some 

 instances,- where an irregular thickening of the surface is of no 

 consequence, or where wanted, the glue-brush may be dipped 

 into the dry sand and worked upon the object until it is covered, 

 and this, followed by throwing on sand with some little violence, 

 will often effectually complete the work. 



Artificial " rockwork " may be roughly divided into two 

 distinct classes — " fancy " and natural, — and each class is 

 divisible into two or more varieties. 



The " fancy " rockwork is that which usually obtains in the 

 " stuffing " world and in most old museums, and is simply 

 brown paper crumpled up into unnatural folds and shapes, and 

 glued and sanded. This variety of the first (and worst) class 

 stands a silent witness to the astounding simplicity of its 

 manufacturer, who thinks that it can, by any stretch of the 

 imagination, be considered anything else but very badly — 

 indeed inartistically — wrinkled brown paper. Sometimes this 

 " rockwork," or " rocking," as it is more frequently called, is 

 coloured. 



Another variety is embellished with the heads of dyed 

 " everlasting " flowers, cut off short and stuck about the 

 " rocking " where they are likely to do the most harm ; and 

 yet another is lined out, wherever it touches the back of the 

 case in which it is placed, with lines of pulverised pyrites or 



