ON PRESERVING BIRDS. 



269 



shot holes. As blood will often have issued out before 

 you have laid hold of the bird, find out the shot holes, 

 by dividing the feathers with your fingers and blowing 

 on them, and then, with your penknife, or the leaf of 

 a tree, carefully remove the clotted blood, and put a 

 little cotton on the hole. If, after all, the plumage has 

 not escaped the marks of blood ; or if it has imbibed 

 slime from the ground, wash the part in water, without 

 soap, and keep gently agitating the feathers, with your 

 fingers, till they are quite dry. Were you to wash 

 them, and leave them to dry by themselves, they would 

 have a very mean and shrivelled appearance. 



In the act of skinning a bird, you must 

 ning Ct thetod" either have it upon a table, or upon your 

 knee. Probably, you will prefer your knee ; 

 because when you cross one knee over the other, and 

 have the bird upon the uppermost, you can raise it to 

 your eye, or lower it, at pleasure, by means of the foot 

 on the ground, and then your knee will always move 

 in unison with your body, by which much stooping 

 will be avoided and lassitude prevented. 



With these precautionary hints in mind, we will now 

 proceed to dissect a bird. Suppose we take a hawk. 

 The little birds will thank us, with a song, for his death, 

 for he has oppressed them sorely; and in size he is 

 just the thing. His skin is also pretty tough, and the 

 feathers adhere to it. 



We will put close by us a little bottle of the solution 

 of corrosive sublimate in alcohol ; also a stick like a 

 common knitting needle, and a handful or two of 

 cotton. Now fill the mouth and nostrils of the bird 

 with cotton, and place it upon your knee on its back, 

 with its head pointing to your left shoulder. Take 



