first, by facilitating the means of enveloping the model entirely, the form of which had not been altered; and, secondly, by ensuring its speedy desiccation. This last had not been the least alarming, for we feared that the humidity secreted in the skin might concentrate in such a manner (notwithstanding we had taken the precaution to give the wooden model a coat of oil paint) as to occasion mouldiness in the parts exposed to the air. The alum with which it was saturated soon crystallised on the interior, which at first gave it a very ugly grey colour; but we entirely got rid of it by rubbing the surface of the skin, first with spirits of turpentine, and then with oil of olives."
Some little hints which occurred to me as being useful to the animal mounter I will now jot down: I have been frequently asked, "Supposing I get a fat dog, or animal of any kind, to set up, how can I manage such a subject satisfactorily? If I leave the fat on the skin I am doing wrong in every way, and if I trim it cleanly off, as it should be done, I stretch the skin to such an extent that my dog is completely out of shape, and though formerly a 'pug' he speedily becomes a 'greyhound.' In fact, I am in a quandary, and do not know what to do."
My reply is: Try what a hot knife will do passed over the skin, with sand or sawdust thrown on to absorb the fat as it melts off. Candidly speaking, however, it is purely a matter of experience to trim fat off a skin without stretching it to any alarming degree, and in very fine-skinned animals, if we find them stretch in spite of all care, we take advantage of wrinkles to sew up here and tuck in there, resorting even, in extreme cases, to cutting away portions of the skin, notably in those parts underneath, hidden by the subsequent operation of mounting.
The skin of the soles of the feet of some animals requires paring down. The bear is an instance of this. The hands of monkeys also must be carefully skinned out to the extreme tips of the fingers. These latter animals are best skinned out from the back, as a great many of our "relatives" have but little hair on the abdomen to hide the stitches, added to which their usually upright position tends still more to show up any defect in sewing.
Peat and straw may sometimes be used with advantage in the bodies of large animals.
Moles may be very well mounted by being cut across from one hind limb to the other, just under the tail, skinned out, preserved, and the skin then filled with sand or dry plaster.
Hedgehogs, if required to be curled up, may be also filled with sand, then tied up in a cloth, and hung up to dry.
Bats are skinned out from the back or front according to the position it is required to show them in. A thin piece of wire is doubled; each end is then pulled out at right angles for a certain distance up its length, and pushed into the hollows of the bones of the "wings." The animal is then stuffed with chopped tow, sand, or sawdust, sewn up, leaving the doubled wire outside; a hole is then made in a board (of the length and breadth suited to the specimen), through which the wire passes, and the "wings" are kept in place, until dry, by fine needle-points, or entomological pins passed through the joints, or by braces of cardboard. The ears, if long, are best blocked with cork cut to fit the inside, and then bound round with "wrapping cotton." The shrivelled ears of these and much larger animals may be got into proper shape by careful ironing.
Mice, small leverets, or rabbits, will be found very useful, if roughly stuffed, to place in the mouth or under the feet of birds or small beasts of prey. These animals, if very young, had better be placed for an hour or so in benzoline or in one of the hardening solutions (Nos. 15 or 16). This remark applies with especial force to animals as yet unborn, which the naturalist will sometimes find during work, and will wish to preserve. These foetal specimens, however, let it be remembered, are of the greatest consequence in the study of embryology, and should always be preserved intact in a fluid medium of some kind. Sometimes the operator comes across a foetus of some rarity, which, if not large, can be preserved in a small "preparation" jar, filled with best rectified spirits of wine, as being not too expensive for such subjects.