72 
80C. OF AM. TAXIDEKMISTS, ANNUAL EBPOKT. 
NOTE ON THE VALUE OF ANIMAL ILLUSTRA- 
TIONS TO TAXIDERMISTS. 
BY P. "W. STAEBNEE. 
) 
It would seem almost superfluous to insist on the value, nay, 
the absolute necessity of good illustrations as aids to the taxider- 
mist, were it not that the importance of the subject appears to 
be hardly yet fully appreciated by many of the very ones to be 
most benefited. 
There was a time, now happily past, as the work exhibited by 
this association abundantly proves, when individuals who mounted 
“ birds and animals ” (as their cards set forth) were content to 
ram a hide full of packing material, sew it up, and call the effigy 
by this or that name according as this or that animal was desired. 
The degree of monstrosity, if it may be so termed, thus produced 
was in inverse ratio to the care of the workman for his art and 
his knowledge (often scant enough) of the external appearance 
of the animal he was attempting to reproduce. These monstro- 
sities of taxidermy are still to be seen in ma»y of our public 
museums where, let us hope, they at least serve the purpose of 
teaching the younger generation how not to do it. 
As in all other departments of human activity, so in this is 
the skilled workman plainly superseding the unskilled, and the 
class of work thus becoming more and more a source of pride 
and satisfaction. The man with a love for his art, necessarily 
something of a naturalist and with a naturalist’s care anxious 
about the correctness of all the details of his work, must utilize 
all the aids at his command, and of these aids accurate drawings 
and paintings occupy the chief place. These are the taxider- 
mist’s works of reference to which he goes for information pre- 
cisely as another goes to his encyclopaedia, since the ability is 
given to no man to carry all the minute points of an animal’s 
external appearance in his mind. That the representations for 
this purpose should be what are strictly understood as works of 
art is obviously unnecessary. The objects to be secured, how- 
