Practical taxidermy

by Montagu Browne

But there is no excuse now-a-days for allowing the bare skin to become shrivelled. The colours we cannot preserve, the form we can and ought to reproduce. No one would conceive, after inspecting a dried specimen, how round, full, and pouting were once those black and wrinkled mandibles, and how delicately they had been coloured while the animal retained life. Their natural hue is rather curious, the outer surface of the upper mandible being very dark grey, spotted profusely with black, and its lower surface pale flesh-colour. In the lower mandible the inner surface is flesh-coloured, and the outer surface pinky white, sometimes nearly pure white."

All this could easily be avoided by the taxidermist first skinning the beak and lips to their farthest extent, and then filling them with clay or composition, and afterwards waxing and colouring the parts in question.

Small birds having black feet or bills, which permanently retain their colour, need only to have them slightly brushed with oil, before casing up, to give them proper freshness.

HOLLOW EYES. — I have for a great number of years discarded the conventional glass eyes — glass buttons I have heard them irreverently termed! — for all fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammals, excepting the smallest, using, in their stead, hollow half-globes rather more oval than round; these are hand-painted on the inside with either water or oil-colours, and when dry are varnished, filled in with wadding and putty, or modelling-wax, not clay, and fixed in the orbits with wax, see ante. These, properly coloured, and, in the instance of fishes, gilded inside, are wonderful representations of the natural eye, and when properly inserted, the cornea in mammals reproduced by wax, and the eyelids properly managed, give a most life-like and natural appearance to any specimen. [Footnote: Glass eyes have of late been much improved in shape and colour by the Germans, and also by some English eyemakers, who have had the sense to listen to the suggestions of artistic taxidermists. I have by me now a really beautiful pair of glass lynx eyes, veined and streaked, and "cornered" in porcelain, in almost as perfect a manner as could be managed by hand-painting.]

"PIECE MOULDS" AND MODELLING TONGUES, MUSCLES, etc.., IN COMPOSITION. — As I stated at the end of Chapter VII., "composition" has for its base one of three things — clay, plaster, or wax. The uses of the first I have fully explained — glue-water and plaster will stiffen or toughen it. There is also "terra-cotta" clay, which, if moulded into shape, can be "fired," and is lighter, and retains its shape without cracking. Its service to the taxidermist is limited to the reproduction of certain bones and some few natural objects, such as fungi, etc..

Plaster casts of almost anything may be made by "piece-casting," which is casting arranged to take moulds from anything "undercut" or complicated; such, let us say, as a lion's head with open jaws, or the human face, surrounded by a wreath of leaves and flowers, as in the antique sculptures. Assuming you had such a model as this to cast from, you would commence by oiling or soaping the whole in the ordinary manner. The plaster being prepared, is poured on the neck or chin, being prevented from spreading to other parts by clay placed across as a barrier. The first section, being cast, is trimmed, and its edges cut diagonally toward the chin, in such a manner that the next piece ultimately unlocks from it, without being wedged by undercasting.

So you may proceed, trimming each piece, cutting its edges to prevent locking, and casting bit by bit until you reach the hair and forehead, with wreath. Here the pieces will be numerous, and your ingenuity will be exercised to keep out of trouble from getting some piece or another to lock the others. The face will often mould into three or four pieces; but it is on the forehead, chin, and throat — and, if a lion's head, in the open mouth — where the multiplicity of parts may perplex.

These small pieces are, when taken from off the model, very difficult to put together again without a core; hence, when the mould is complete, each little piece must have a shallow hole cut on its top, be replaced on the model, and a "jacket-mould" cut into two or more pieces by string (as described at chapter VII) made over the whole. This jacket keeps all together for the ultimate casting by the pegs in its surface made by the holes of the pieces underneath.

The ultimate cast is made by plaster being poured into a hole left at one end of the mould for that purpose. Should this ultimate casting be wanted hollow, it will be necessary to shake the plaster, when poured in, around the mould in the manner described for making wax fruit.

Small undercut articles may be cast from, by making a mould of best glue — "gelatine glue" — which readily stretches enough to "clear" undercuts and come off the model. To get a model from this glue mould, cover the original model you wish to cast from with as thick a covering of clay as you wish your gelatine mould to be when run; upon this pour plaster to form a "jacket," letting its top and bottom rest on the top and bottom of the original model. When the clay is removed, and the "jacket" fitted on again, it will, of course, only touch at top and bottom, leaving an interspace all over the remainder of the model. A hole being now cut in the "jacket," the glue [Footnote: Made by steeping for a night, and allowing it to absorb all the water it will, throwing away the surplus, and boiling the remainder in the usual manner in a glue-kettle. Pour on when hot, not boiling.] is poured in over the original oiled model, and fills up the interspace left by the removal of the clay. When cold, it, of course, forms a mould into which plaster can be run, in the usual manner, to form the ultimate model.