The seasonal groups of Spring, Autumn, Summer and Winter have been produced by most bird taxidermists at some time. Appropriate varieties of small birds are the blue birds for Spring; gold finches, Autumn; yellow birds or tanagers, Summer; snow birds, Winter. Framed with painted backgrounds and suitable accessories their shallow wall cases may be hung like pictures.
Never make the mistake of grouping animals that would never meet in natural circumstances or furnish them with incongruous surroundings.
The arrangement of groups for the exhibition cases of museums is very exacting as they are made open to the view on all sides. In order to judge of the affect such groups are modelled in miniature clay figures which are changed and re-arranged until satisfactory before the mounting is begun.
Such work is rather out of our province but an intelligent arrangement of two or more figures can be made to convey many more ideas than a single one would suggest.
Some of the most striking groups are those of the larger carnivora in combat, but they hardly possess the real value of painstaking life studies of some of our more familiar kindred of the wild.
CHAPTER XXVII.
ANIMAL ANATOMY.
A knowledge of this subject coupled with the necessary mechanical ability will enable their possessor to take place in the front ranks of taxidermists. Even if we have but little opportunity to study the anatomy of some of the rarer varieties of animal forms we can inform ourselves of certain typical features possessed in common by other more common members of the same great family or species.
Press and camera supplies us with much reliable information on the subject. Books on natural history, travels and sports were never so complete, interesting, and withal, so easy of access as they are nowadays.