The Teeming East 31 



gum Arabic, and made a paste as thick as cream 

 with dental plaster. To prevent spoiling, we 

 poisoned it with corrosive sublimate, and to pre- 

 vent the cement from hardening too soon, we put 

 into each rubber cup in which we mixed it a few 

 drops of a thin solution of LaPage's glue. Please 

 remember we did not have then, as now a fine 

 press drUl, the best manufactured, but a breast 

 drill. One of us would often have to hold tho 

 rib, while the other bored a hole, and the time it 

 took was trying to both. The boy who turns the 

 grindstone had a picnic compared to us. If a 

 mistake was made, too much force used, the rib 

 would be broken, and fall to the floor and break 

 again into a dozen pieces. So it became a byword 

 with me, when we actually finished a rib, and 

 had it fast in its place, "We are one rib nearer 

 home." We soon learned, that it was absolutely 

 impossible to tell when a skeleton of this kind 

 could be mounted. If we dropped a rib it might 

 take a week to bore into the ends of the frag- 

 ments and insert the small rods of battered iron, 

 and cement them together. But patience will al- 

 ways win, no matter what the obstacle. At last 

 our skeleton was mounted, but I notified Dr. 

 Brock, the Director, and Mr. Lambe the Paleon- 

 tologist too soon, forgetting the base had to be 

 made of plaster. Just at the moment our plaster 

 was hardening and we needed our wits about us, 

 we ourselves were covered to the eyes with it, 

 these gentlemen stepped down to view our mount. 



