Practical Taxidermy Part 27

When thoroughly dry, the ferns may be coloured with oil paint thinned with turps and varnish, sufficient to give l.u.s.tre without shininess.

Here and there break the green colour with white, red, blue, and yellow, in a manner which will occur to anyone having artistic ability. Ferns treated in this manner soon dry, and retain their colour for an indefinite period, the only thing to be said against them being their rather unnatural flatness--due to pressure; this, however, may be counteracted by a little judgment during the drying, one plan being the regulation of pressure at certain points, aided also by clean dry sand.

Several hard-leaved plants (mostly foreign) found in our conservatories are also excellent driers, many taking colour readily.

Many gra.s.ses (not the flowers, but the leaves or blades) dry well.

Amongst the best of these is the "wiregra.s.s," found in woods, growing especially over runnels in those localities. The flower also of this plant is most eligible as a decorative agent. The wood melick is another elegant and suitable plant.

The sedges (Carex) dry and colour well, as also several of the water-rushes, reeds, and flags. The "toad-rush" (Juncus bufonius), and its allies, found in damp places, by roads, by ca.n.a.ls, and in pasture or corn-fields, dry and colour excellently.

Sphagnum, or bog moss, especially when having pink tips, is a most beautiful object; the only thing to be said against it is the difficulty of getting it free from water, and the length of time it takes afterwards to dry.

Mosses of various sorts growing in woods on trees--lichens, gold and grey, mosses or lichen-covered twigs, sprigs of heather, furze, sea-lavender--all dry well, and come in usefully.

Many persons like their moss and gra.s.ses dyed: this is perhaps allowable in some cases for common work; but if a bird or a mammal is nicely mounted, the plainer the fitting, and nearer nature, the better. To those, however, who desire to dye their gra.s.ses, I recommend Judson's powder dyes as the readiest medium, the directions for manipulating which are given with them. Any rough gra.s.s in flower does for dyeing, and a visit to the fields just before haymaking will supply the amateur with all he wants for this.

Teazles, thistles, and the umbels (seed-heads) of various plants, chiefly compositae, will be found of service; but everything must be thoroughly dried before being coloured, or before being introduced into shades or cases. Nothing must be coloured with water colours or gums, as some writers contend, or mould will inevitably follow. A few drops of creosote, or the black carbolic acid of commerce, poured into the case or shade just before closing up, is a very good thing to prevent mildew, though if everything is thoroughly dried, and only oil colours are used, no danger from this cause need be apprehended.

SEA-WEEDS, Sh.e.l.lS, ETC.--Sea-weeds, which are constantly used in fitting up cases of sea birds, need no description as to their collection, further than to say that all sea-weeds, whether sea-weeds proper, corallines, and zoophytes, must be well washed in spring water, many times changed, to thoroughly remove the salt, and must be well dried before being introduced into cases or shades. Those who require full descriptions of British sea-weeds, their collection and preservation, I must refer to "British Marine Algae," by W. H.

Grattan, published at the office of The Bazaar, 170, Strand, London.

Few sea-weeds proper are applicable to the purpose of the taxidermist, though some of the oar-weeds can be used, and many of the red sea-weeds (Rhodosperms) can be floated out in water and carelessly arranged on paper, if wanted for fitting-up purposes, or more carefully arranged if for a collection. After washing, these small plants adhere by their natural mucilage to the paper on which they may be floated out.

Of all the sea-weeds proper the Carrageen mosses (Chondrus crispus and mamillosus) are the most eligible, and if dried and arranged in cases are very elegant. The common coralline (Corallina officinalis)--a sea-weed which so rapidly attracts carbonate of lime as to be almost of a stony or coral-like texture--is another invaluable plant for fitting up. When wet it is usually purple or pink, but on exposure to the sun becomes white.

Amongst the zoophytes which, though looking like the sea-weeds, are not of vegetable origin, there are many which are most useful, not to say indispensable to the taxidermist. Leaving out the foreign corals, sea-fans, sponges, etc, we shall certainly find the most useful English species to be first: the broad leaved horn-wrack (Fl.u.s.tra foliacia), that ma.s.s of thin hand-like leaves, of the colour of brown paper, which is cast up on some sh.o.r.es, often in great quant.i.ties. Other useful sorts are those like little trees, such as the common sea fir (Sertularia, abietina and operculata); these last are found especially attached to stones, sh.e.l.ls and sea-weeds. The lobster's horn coralline (Antennularia antennina) and the various sponges are also most useful things, the branched sponge (Halichondria oculata) and others being amongst the best for use. Several of the bladder-wracks or "sea-grapes" will dry nicely, as also will the egg cases of the whelk and the "sea purses" and "skate barrows," really the egg bags of the dogfish and skate.

The starfish, or "five fingers," will, after washing, dry well, or can be plunged in any one of the hardening solutions mentioned in Chapter IV. The various sea urchins (Echinii), if emptied of their contents, make pretty objects, either with or without their spines. The beautiful sea anemones are, however, impossible to preserve as dried objects, but must be modelled in gla.s.s or wax, as imitations. Various sh.e.l.ls come in handily also; amongst those may be mentioned the common razor sh.e.l.ls (Solen ensis and siliqua), several of the Venus sh.e.l.ls, the common limpets, the chitons, several of the trochi, and last, but not least, the sh.e.l.ls of the speckled scallop (Pecten varius).

Many freshwater, as also land sh.e.l.ls, come in for decorating cases of littoral birds. Amongst those of the first we may instance Limnoea stagnalis, pal.u.s.tris, peregra, etc, Dreissena polymorpha, Planorbis corneus, etc.; the various Unios, anodons, and many others.

Amongst the land sh.e.l.ls very many of the Helices, such as the gaily-coloured nemoralis, or its variety hortensis, caperata, arbustorum, cantiana, etc, as well as many other specimens.

The preservation of most freshwater and land sh.e.l.ls is exceedingly easy, the greater number of specimens requiring only to be plunged into boiling water, and the contents removed--an easy operation in the case of the bivalves, and the contents of univalves or snail-like sh.e.l.ls being also easily wormed out with a pin or crooked awl.

[Footnote: Mr. R. B. Woodward, F.G.S, etc. in one of the very best and most practical of those wonderful little penny "Handbooks" for young collectors, advises a large spoonful of salt being added to the boiling water, for two reasons, one, because it puts them out of pain at once, and also makes their subsequent extraction more easy. "It is a good plan (says he) to soak the smaller sh.e.l.ls in cold water (without salt), before killing them, as they swell out with the water, and do not when dead retreat so far into their sh.e.l.ls."]

For works on sh.e.l.ls see "Manual of the Mollusca," by Dr. S. P.

Woodward, J. Gywn-Jeffreys' "British Conchology," Lovell Reeve's "British Land and Freshwater Mollusks," and several clever articles in Science Gossip and the Conchological Journal, by Mr. G. Sherriff Tye and others.

Glue is sufficient to fix all these objects in their places on rockwork, in cases; resins, such as mastic or sh.e.l.lac, or any of the cements mentioned in Chapter IV, are, however, the best mediums to fix such objects upon tablets for scientific purposes. For fixing sh.e.l.ls on labelled cards, Mr. Woodward recommends gum arabic, with one-sixth of its bulk of pure glycerine added to it, which makes a semi-elastic cement, with the advantage also of allowing the sh.e.l.ls to be taken from their tablets, at any time, by the intervention of hot water.

DRYING AND STORAGE OF SPECIMENS.--It is always a vexed question how to keep newly-mounted specimens free from moths, and flies, and dust, whilst drying. The difficulty is, that you cannot put them away at once in boxes, cases, or shades, for if you do they do not dry at all, but "sweat" and slowly rot, or else become mildewed. If you expose them fully without any covering, they are soon covered with dust, and liable at any moment to--first, the attacks of meat flies, and next of moths and beetles.

Good insect powder is, as I have before pointed out, a deterrent; still, to make a.s.surance doubly sure, I would always, in the case of valuable specimens, enclose them in square cages, made one side of gla.s.s, and the three other sides and top of fine meshed muslin, wirework, or perforated zinc, the latter sufficiently fine not to allow small moths and flies to creep in. These can be made of various sizes, can be varied by having a top and back of wood, can have the front to open like a meat safe with shelves, or be simply cases to lift over the specimens like shades; in any case, however, the front gla.s.s allows you to see how all is going on, and the wire sides permit a free current of air to pa.s.s through to dry the specimens.

In this manner I have been enabled to laugh at the little wretches of insects buzzing around, and flattening their noses against the zinc, in vain endeavours to interview some charming specimens of young birds, whose "fluffy" plumage they delight in. Like the cats, they are "so fond of noticing those dear little birds!"

Skins not in constant use for reference should, when dried, be wrapped in soft paper amidst insect powder, and put away in closely fitting drawers. "Paper fasteners" are very useful to clip the ends of the paper--folded over--which encloses them.

AQUARIA.--This being a subject a little outside my province, I do not purpose dwelling on it, further than to say that all information will be found in "The Aquarium, its History, Structure, and Management," by Dr. J. E. Taylor, F.L.S, etc.; Gosse's "Handbook of the Marine Aquarium," and many others. Two recipes, culled from the Scientific American, 1879, may be of service, however: "Cheap tanks can be made of wood and gla.s.s, the frame and bottom being of wood, and sides of gla.s.s. In order to make the joints watertight, care must be taken to get a proper aquarium putty or cement. The following is a good recipe: Put an egg-cupful of oil and 4 oz. tar to 1 lb. resin, melt over a gentle fire, test it to see if it has the proper consistency when cooled; if it has not, heat longer, or add more resin or tar. Pour the cement into the angles in a heated state, but not boiling hot, as it would crack the gla.s.s. The cement will be firm in a few minutes. Then tip the aquarium in a different position, and treat a second angle likewise, and so on. The cement does not poison the water."

"To mend the broken gla.s.s of an aquarium, fasten a strip of gla.s.s over the crack, inside the aquarium, using for a cement white sh.e.l.lac dissolved in one-eighth its weight of Venice turpentine."

CHAPTER XIV.

GENERAL REMARKS ON ARTISTIC "MOUNTING," MODELLED FOLIAGE, SCREENS, LAMPS, NATURAL HISTORY JEWELLERY, ETC.

ARTISTIC MOUNTING.--GENERAL REMARKS.--By the time the student has slowly worked his way to this chapter, he will no doubt--should he be apt, and have an artistic mind--have achieved things beyond the mere drudgery of the profession. I take it that, being interested in his work, he will not have rested content with mounting--even in a perfect manner--his animals at rest, but will have "had a shy" at animals in action, or engaged in some characteristic occupation. The days of birds on "hat-pegs," stiff-legged, long-necked and staring, round-eyed, at nothing--of mammals, whose length and stiffness are their greatest merit--has pa.s.sed away for ever; and only in dreary museums, far behind the age, where funereal silence obtains, and where the dust of mummied animals arises to awe and half poison the adventurous explorer, are these "specimens" to be found.

Public museums are, unfortunately, in nine cases out of ten, not good schools for delineating the natural att.i.tudes or characteristics of animals. This arises partly from the fact that all, save the more modern ones, retain their original specimens mounted in the old style.

The newer work of the museums of London, Paris, Madrid, etc, is, however generally of quite a different stamp. [Footnote: Since this was written, the new South Kensington Natural History Museum has been built and I lately had the pleasure of a private view--through the courtesy of Mr. R. Bowdler Sharpe F.L.S.--of the new style of mounting of the future, i.e. pairs of birds their nests and young, surrounded with carefully-modelled foliage and accessories. I there saw a bunch of "willow-herb" magnificently modelled. I was pleased, however, from an artist's point of view, to discover that we in Leicester could give them a "Roland for an Oliver" in our white-throats, together with their nest and young, surrounded by a modelled bramble-bush in blossom; and with our swallows in section of a cow-house--neither of which groups have yet been attempted for the national collection. I am trembling with apprehension, however, that ere long Mr. Sharpe and his "merry men"--one of them, a German, the cleverest bird-mounter I ever saw--will leave us in the lurch. Nevertheless, healthy emulation of the best features of our national collection will do us no harm. ]

This struck me most forcibly with regard to that of Madrid, which I visited some years ago. The vertebrate specimens were old and wretchedly mounted, the lepidoptera nowhere; but the recently acquired animals were splendidly rendered. The youthful and painstaking amateur will, no doubt, however, do as I did when a boy--viz, pitch upon some professional taxidermist, to whose window he will repair at all available opportunities to learn his style, now and then venturing on some small purchase (usually a pair of eyes), to gain admittance to the glories within, and have speech with the great man himself.

Exploring in this manner, I have had occasion to thank many of the leading London taxidermists for little "tips" ungrudgingly given.

A few hints may suffice to help the reader. The most important canon is: Do not mix your orders of birds; that is to say, abstain from surrounding a hawk tearing its prey, with various birds in all att.i.tudes, placidly ignoring the existence of their enemy. A scene of this kind irresistibly reminds me of the stage "aside," when the villain of the piece audibly proclaims vengeance against the unconscious hero but two yards away on his right or left.

Birds not of the same kind, and from different parts of the world, are often cased together, but this is open to criticism, unless you avowedly wish to ill.u.s.trate the whole order for purposes of reference, as in the instance of, say, the Columbae (pigeons). Pairs of birds are the most effective, if the idea of the surroundings is nicely carried out.

I have seen one or two very funny effects in the "Black Country." In one example, a scarlet ibis, mounted in a case on a broken piece of highly gorgeous china gaselier; in another, two puppies facing each other on velvet, a piece of rock salt in the middle, on which stood a lapwing, surrounded by foreign birds in all att.i.tudes. Need I warn the reader against such flights of fancy and works of art?

It is, I would remark, quite impossible to give directions as to att.i.tudes, but on one point I might advise, in order to save the many inquiries addressed to me, from time to time, upon the subject of the straightness or otherwise of gulls' legs. The fact is--gulls, when standing, tuck the tibia quite close to the abdomen, apparently under the wing, and reveal only a very little portion of the tibio-tarsal joint, keeping the metata.r.s.e perfectly straight, or, as someone wrote to me once, "like two arrows or sticks." (For explanation of these parts named, see Plate II, (N, q, P.) )

Although most works on taxidermy profess to give descriptions of the att.i.tudes of animals, I cannot do so for the simple reason that I consider the acquirement a speciality and purely a matter of experience. Nature must be closely studied; failing this, reference must be made to ill.u.s.trated works on natural history. All of Gould's works are grand guides to att.i.tudes of specimens and accessories, as also that beautiful work of my friend H. E. Dresser, F.L.S, etc, on the "Birds of Europe;" but as the price of these magnificent works places them beyond the reach of any but rich people, the amateur may fall back on Morris's "British Birds" and Bree's "Birds of Europe" for coloured plates, and Routledge's "Wood's Natural History" for uncoloured plates of many mammals, birds, and fishes; those signed by Coleman being especially artistic and natural. Add to these Ca.s.sell's new "Natural History," edited by Dr. Duncan, F.R.S.--really the best book on popular natural history we have.

Other works, perhaps not so easily accessible, are the "Proceedings of the Zoological Society," and the "Ibis," for coloured ill.u.s.trations of animals--often in characteristic att.i.tudes, and which, with the above-named works, fitly replace the more ancient "pictures" of animals, arranged on the "fore and aft" system, and from which instead of nature, our taxidermists took their original ideas; indeed, the English school, with true British insularity, would, I presume, have continued the mounting of animals by this "fore and aft" method, had not the Germans and French broken rudely in on our slumbering taxidermists at the Great Exhibition of 1851. [Footnote: Is it not singular that even now anything stiff, inartistic, "solidly" (i.e.

clumsily) made, or behind the age, is cherished with the utmost veneration, as being a proof of the solidity of our "Old English Methods" (and skulls)!]

I propose now to give a few hints on groups, etc, not describing their management, but merely giving a list of subjects. First, let me say that in order of merit, in all arts connected with the preservation of natural history objects, I must, after many years study, give the palm to the Germans, not only in all matters connected with artistic taxidermy, but in their elegant and truthful setting of beetles, their sensible setting of lepidoptera, and their really beautiful method of making skins of birds etc.

Next come the French, then the English, and lastly, the Americans. The Americans are the worst simply because they adopt the crudest English methods of taxidermy, with other bad habits of ours. I may say that I never saw an artistic piece of work, nor a well made skin, coming from America, unless done by a German or a Frenchman. I believe, however, the European element is working wonders amongst them, and reading Mr.

Batty's book (if he be a true American), I was very favourably impressed with the signs of progress contained therein, and I should not at all wonder if soon our American friends "go ahead" and quickly leave us behind.

Professor Henry a. Ward, of Rochester, New York, U.S.A, in a well-written article in one of his "Bulletins" sent to me, has, since I wrote the above, confessed the great superiority of European over American taxidermists, but says that within the last few (very few) years, their native taxidermists have greatly improved, owing to the importation of clever foreign artists, who are gradually educating the American workmen.

Just before this there was an entertaining article in the "Century"

magazine, and ill.u.s.trations were given showing the best work of the American taxidermic artists. I must say, however, that, unless the draughtsman failed to copy what an educated eye looks for, none of this work struck me as being of a high order--one or two "pieces,"

indeed, being decidedly capable of improvement. Possibly this improvement has taken place by now; anyway, I heartily wish Brother Jonathan good luck in his taxidermic studies.

At present, however, I say to all rising taxidermists, follow the lead of the Germans--they are true artists; and with the Italian modelling and French neatness of workmanship to fall back on, success is certain.

Looking back to '51, let us see what one of these foreigners (mentioned in chapter I) could teach us. Among over fifty groups of animals shown in the Great Exhibition were:

A stag caught by five hounds (price 180 pounds).

A wild boar set on by three hounds.

A couple of old and young foxes in front of their "earth" (60 pounds).