men, no matter how badly disfigured, than a
hopefully reconstructed mosaic, no matter how artistic. For some
purposes one could use more radical "relaxing" procedures instead.
Browne seems to have used only cool water vapour or sometimes liquid
water. Careful application of hot steam can relax most specimens that
otherwise could not be re-set. One good trick (Beware of the risks of
cuts and scalding if your apparatus should burst!) is to boil water
in a closed vessel, leading the steam out into a tube, preferably of
silicone rubber, tipped with a drawn glass tube or the blunted needle
of a syringe. Direct steam at the parts that need relaxing. With
practice you often can relax legs or wings one at a time, stopping
as soon as they reach the desired position.

* Note too, that Browne is cheerful about mounting some insects by
gumming their feet (tarsi) to card. For entomological purposes this
has severe disadvantages. Nowadays professionals hardly ever use any
means of setting that prevent one from examining a specimen from all
sides. Even mounting them on a transparent material tends to interfere
with proper examination. For most purposes pin the insects using what
Browne called "flat" setting, high on the pin, with the label beneath.
Where this is not practical, such as for tiny specimens, there are
other methods, which you may see described in manuals or used in
museums.

* Note: Browne wrote in pre-decimal days, using largely the so-called
Imperial units. This might raise difficulties in understanding his
quantities. E.g. his dram or drachm (drm) probably was 0.125 ounce
(roughly 3.5 grams). His pound would be sixteen ounces (oz.) of 28.35
grams, but his pint would be twenty fluid ounces (not 16 as in
American pints!) Correspondingly his gallon would be ten pounds, not
eight. A grain would be about 65 mg. Of other units and utensils
apparently common in Browne's day, such as "six-pound Australian meat
tins", or "goffering-irons", make what sense you may. A
"wine-bottleful" was probably about 700 cc.

* Note: I have had little use for hexavalent chrome compounds but
one thing I did notice in experimenting with a few of Browne's
recommendations ("bichromates", "chromic acid" etc), is that the
merest few drops of such compounds (typically as a solution of potassium
dichromate or chromate) added to water containing soft creatures such
as molluscs, generally will kill them gently by paralysis and
leave them relaxed. Us