now for many
years, and have never had cause to alter my opinion as to its
efficacy. The best only must be procured, from some well-known
wholesale house, price about 3s. per lb. That sold made up in small
quantities is generally adulterated and useless. No curator should
ever be without it, and a small quantity should always be placed
inside a newly-made skin. It can also be worked up in many of the
preservative pastes, or macerated in spirit as a wash, for the inside
of skins.

Baking or stowing maggot-infected specimens is recommended by some
authors, but I strongly object to it in the case of old or valuable
skins, firstly, because the heat can seldom be properly regulated,
unless in an apparatus specially constructed; secondly, because heat
sufficient to kill the larvae is also sufficient to crimp or twist
some part of the plumage or render the skin, if an old specimen, too
crisp or tender for ultimate handling; thirdly, because even a
moderate degree of heat is sufficient to set free the fat contained in
the skin, and thus spoil the feathers.

Perhaps the tyro may remark, "But in a preserved and stuffed skin
there ought to be no fat to ooze out." Quite true, there ought not to
be, but as skins are usually dressed with arsenical soap, the fat,
instead of being dried up, is beautifully conserved, ready to run out
at the slightest provocation, or be drawn out by the capillary
attraction of the threads used in sewing up--another hard knock for
arsenical pastes!

Writing about pastes reminds me that no taxidermist should be without
a pot of flour paste, which is far better and more cleanly than gum or
glue for sticking in loose feathers, etc. For a small quantity,
sufficient to fill a jam-pot, take

No. 31.--Flour Paste.

Good wheat flour, 2 oz.

Essence of cloves, 0.5 a teaspoonful.

Water, 0.5 pint.

Mix the flour with part of the water in a basin, being careful to
crush out all the lumps, and work it up smoothly to the consistence of
thick cream; add the remainder of the water, and boil for a few
minutes in a saucepan. Turn out into a jam-pot, and when nearly cold
stir in the essence of cloves; this latter gives an agreeable odour to
the paste, is not poisonous, and preserves the paste indefinitely from
turning mouldy. A few drops of carbolic acid may be used instead of
the cloves; but in this case the pot must be labelled "Poison."

Strong gum water may be made from gum arabic, into