eginning at
the stalk and rubbing it regularly towards the crown. The fibres are
most tender towards the extremities, and are therefore to be treated
with great care there. When the pulp has thus been cleared pretty well
off, the point of a fine penknife may be of use to pick away the pulp
sticking to the core. In order to see how the operation advances, the
soiled water must be thrown away from time to time, and clean poured
on in its place. When the pulp is in this manner perfectly separated,
the clean skeleton is to be preserved in spirits of wine.

2332. To make Impressions of Leaves.

Prepare two rubbers by tying up wool or any other substance in
wash-leather; then prepare the colours in which you wish to print
leaves, by rubbing up with cold drawn linseed oil the tints that are
required, as indigo for blue, chrome for yellow, indigo and chrome for
green, &c. Get a number of leaves the size and kind you wish to stamp,
then dip the rubbers into the paint, and rub them one over the other,
so that you may have but a small quantity of the composition upon the
rubbers; place a leaf upon one rubber and moisten it gently with the
other; take the leaf off and apply it to the substance on which you
wish to make an imprint of the leaf. Upon the leaf place a piece of
white paper, press gently, and a beautiful impression of all the veins
of the leaf will be obtained.

2333. To make a Fac-simile of a Leaf in Copper.

This beautiful experiment can be performed by any person in possession
of a common galvanic battery. The process is as follows:

Soften a piece of gutta percha over a candle, or before a fire; knead
it with the moist fingers upon a table, until the surface is perfectly
smooth, and large enough to cover the leaf to be copied; lay the leaf
flat upon the surface, and press every part well into the
gutta-percha. In about five minutes the leaf may be removed, when, if
the operation has been carefully performed, a perfect impression of
the leaf will be made in the gutta percha.

This must now be attached to the wire in connection with the zinc end
of the battery (which can easily be done by heating the end of the
wire, and pressing it into the gutta percha), dusted well over with
the best blacklead with a camel-hair brush--the object of which is to
render it a conductor of electricity; it should then be completely
immersed in a saturated sol