Tanners' bark 2 lb.
"Mix the whole thoroughly, and after reducing it to a powder pass it through a sieve. Keep in close tin canisters. This powder is more particularly adapted to fill up incisions made in the naked parts of quadrupeds and the skulls of large birds. It has been strongly recommended to us, but, being perfectly satisfied with our own, we have never tried it."
With regard to the foregoing composition I have a few words to say, which are these, that the reason I have copied it is that I have met with it in more books than one, and I wish therefore to call special attention to it, that it may be labelled "Dangerous," and that anyone using it will do so at his peril. Fancy shaking arsenic up in a sieve, and afterwards dusting it in con amore! Really, if people will use poisons, and others put themselves to considerable pains to invent the most deadly compounds for them, is it not criminal carelessness that such things should be published without a word of warning as to their character or effects?
Powders, as a rule, being made of astringents, dry the skin too quickly (especially if a bird is being operated on) to perfectly shape the specimen. As they are useful, however, to fill up and quickly dry cavities in the wings, and such like, of large birds, etc.., and in some cases even to prepare a skin for future stuffing, I will give a powder of my own composition, the chief point of merit of which consists in its being harmless to the user, and also that it has been tried on a large bird's skin, which it so effectually preserved and toughened that, eighteen months afterwards, it was relaxed and stuffed up better than the usual run of made skins:
No. 8. — Browne's Preservative Powder.
Pure tannin, 1 oz.
Red pepper, 1 oz.
Camphor, 1 oz.
Burnt alum, 8 oz.
Pound and thoroughly mix, and keep in stoppered bottles or canisters.