414 TAXIDERMY AND MODELLING 



eminently suitable for the walls of almost any room. This has 

 been in use in England and on the Continent for some years, 

 and of late the Americans seem to have taken it up, as 

 it is mentioned in many of their books upon Taxidermy, but 

 according to The Oologist} Messrs. F. H. Lattin and Company 

 exhibited, at the World's Columbian Exposition, 1893, "A 

 group of Bob- Whites, Colinus virginianus, Linn., under oval 

 convex glass," and this, enclosing seven birds, apparently with 

 foliage, and with a painted scene as a background, was sur- 

 rounded by an elaborate oblong frame — whether of carved 

 wood or of gilt the photographic process-block does not tell. 



Perhaps an improvement on any previous modification of 

 this kind of mount was a pair made in Leicester for the Chicago 

 Exhibition, but which remained after all in England ; one of 

 them enclosed a group of specially selected humming-birds, and 

 the other contained exotic Lepidoptera, arranged as a harmony in 

 blue, metallic green, and gold, which gave excellent results by a 

 certain scheme of arrangement. Each case was, taking the frame- 

 measurement, nearly 4 feet in height by 3 feet in breadth, but was 

 kept to 5 or 6 inches in depth, to give it the appearance of a 

 picture when hanging up. The framework, which was a long 

 octagon, was formed of oak — afterwards gilded — rebated to 

 receive glass all around, and was surrounded with a hand- 

 somely enriched and gilded frame, the back of which was 

 ploughed out to receive the background, and upon which the 

 light framework holding the glass was, secured (see Plate XXIL) 



Museum cases vary quite as much as do museums and 

 curators themselves, and beginning, as nearly all did, in the 

 cucumber- frame style of architecture for the "table-cases," 

 and with small -paned fronts for the wall -cases, they have 

 now become quite important articles of furniture, and a really 

 well made and fitted museum wall -case or centre case for 

 1 Albion, N.Y., April, 1894, vol. xi. No. 4, Whole No. 102. 



