LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 199 



manner. When I was in the Brazilian towns and 

 forests, the ants never injured my specimens in Natural 

 History. 



As you have introduced the name of Sir James Smith, 

 apparently to deprive me of any little merit due to the 

 discovery of applying this solution, tell me, candid Sir, 

 had you then learned, or have you since learned, that 

 Sir James, or any other person, had applied it to birds, 

 to quadrupeds, to serpents, to fishes, to wood, to clothes, 

 to hats, to insects, to the lining of carriages, to furs, and 

 to ornamental feathers ? To all which articles, I had 

 been in the habit of applying it for many years before 

 you received from me your first lesson, in your father's 

 house at Wavertree. 



If you have ascertained the fact, then, your para- 

 graph in Doctor Lardner will be less objectionable; 

 still, give you what credit I may, methinks you have 

 ill-requited the former kindness of your disinterested 

 Mentor. 



You recommend the use of arsenic soap, " from long 

 experience ! " and a little after you prove its deficiency, 

 by acknowledging that "a box, strongly impregnated 

 by camphor, or the oven," must be used when you find 

 it necessary to place your skins " in quarantine." Why 

 in quarantine, Mr. Swainson ? What ! — have your 

 skins got the plague of insects amongst them, after they 

 have been smeared with your wonderful arsenic soap, 

 t which you recommend " from long experience ? " 



I have read over your " Process of Preservation," cer- 

 tainly with more attention than it deserves, and I find 

 it wrong at every point. I am quite prepared to prove, 

 that he who adopts it can never, by any chance, succeed 

 in producing a specimen that will bear a scientific 

 inspection. His preparations will be out of all shape 



