12(y' PRACTICAL TAXIDEEMY. 



as a round ball of feathers, as some tyros are in tlie habit of 

 doing, and also when he says that the bird mnst be well skinned. 



With the next paragraph, as to the uselessness of wire, I 

 totally disagree, and for this reason, that, although I have 

 myself proved it possible — having many years ago followed' 

 Waterton's instructions — to mount a bird entirely without wire, 

 still it is at the best but an amateur's " dodge ; " and I can 

 fearlessly assert that it will not stand the test of work and 

 expediency. It is, in fact, impossible to dispense with wire, if 

 taxidermy is to be followed as a profession. 



As to putting cotton wool between the flesh and the skin,, 

 practice will enable one to do without this. To me it would 

 be a great nuisance, unless in the case of much grease, of 

 persistent bleeding, or clots of extravasated blood occurring. 

 All the rest of the instructions on skinning are sound and 

 practical, except where he advises the knee to be used instead of 

 a table. A little reflection, or, better still, a trial, will convince 

 anyone that nothing can compare in practice with a table or 

 bench for comfortable working. 



I do not hold, either, with the total removal of the skull. For 

 instance, how are you to exhibit the superciliary ridge which 

 gives so distinctive a character to the very bird Waterton selects 

 — the hawk — if you cut it away ? I have tried both plans, and I 

 unhesitatingly say that you cannot give character to the heads 

 of the larger birds if you remove the skull (unless, of course, you 

 choose to model it up in clay, &c., as in the heads of mammals), 

 though I agree that you must free the skin from all its 

 surroundings. I have at the present moment several birds (set 

 up by a man in the West of England), in which the skulls have 

 been removed ; the skin has shrunk in at the back of the head 

 and at the mandibles ; and in one instance — an osprey — the bird 

 has entirely lost its nobility and eagle-like appearance by the 

 removal of the ridge above the eye. 



I cannot urge the advisability of making the body larger to 

 allow for shrinking, inasmuch as in the case of certain birds — 

 notably gulls — which should present an even surface on the 

 breast, the opposite effect will be produced if the false body is 

 unduly large, as then, in place of the evenness so desirable, a 

 division will appear in the centre of the body, which entirely 



