General Observations.—Judging from specimens generally, it would seem that taxidermists, the world over, either do not know how to mount fish specimens with the same degree of excellence as mammals and birds, or else they are universally slighted by intention. Certain it is, that in nearly every large zoological museum the stuffed fishes are the least attractive, and the least like life of all the vertebrates. In many instances the reptiles are not far behind in unsightliness, although as a rule they are a little more life-like than the fishes. In only one natural history museum out of twenty-seven have I found a collection of stuffed fishes which surpassed in number and quality of specimens the collection of birds and mammals, and formed the most attractive feature of the entire museum. That fish collection is to be seen in the Government Museum at Madras, India.

The specimens were all mounted while fresh from the ocean, which, of course, has been a great advantage to the taxidermist. I was somewhat surprised to learn that the taxidermist in question was an Indian native, named P. Anthony Pillay, because East Indian natives are, almost without exception, very indifferent taxidermists.

None of the specimens are mounted on standards, but either lie flat in table cases, or, if too large for that, hang against the wall. The common scaly fishes always lie upon one side, usually the right, with tail curved upward.

Mr. Pillay assured me that the exquisite smoothness of his specimens was due to the use of silk cotton as a filling material, plucked from the pod and cleaned by hand. His scale fishes and sharks were very life-like, but his rays and ray-like Rhinobati were somewhat faulty. Being filled with fibrous material, they lacked that extreme flatness so characteristic of fishes of this type.

Numerous methods for the preparation of fishes have been devised. In the collection in the National Museum made by the Society of American Taxidermists there is a series of six specimens, representing five different methods, mostly bad. One is a fish carved in wood and painted; another is a flimsy paper cast of Dutch extraction; a third is a painted plaster cast; the fourth is a half fish, or fish medallion, and the fifth is an entire stuffed fish. It is necessary to add, however, that the last-mentioned specimen falls far short of properly representing its class—the most common of all in museums. In disposing of this subject it is not my purpose to waste time in the discussion of obsolete and valueless methods, but to describe only those of practical utility.

Mounting Small and Medium-sized Fishes with Scales.—The process of skinning a fish has been described in a previous chapter, and on this subject but few other points remain to be noticed. These are the following:

From some fishes the scales fall off so very easily while they are being skinned and mounted, it is necessary to wipe the specimen dry, and before starting to remove the skin, paste a piece of thin but tough writing-paper over the whole fish excepting the fins, and let it dry before proceeding further. With a pen, line out the course of the opening cut, and make a mark across it here and there to guide you in joining the edges again after mounting. This paper covering will fully protect the scales from displacement, and it is to remain on until the mounting is completed, when its removal is easily accomplished with water and a sponge.

On the great majority of scaled fishes, however, the scales are sufficiently persistent that the above is unnecessary. But keep the fish wet while you are at work upon it, and handle it with care and delicacy. If you let the scales get dry, their edges begin at once to curl up, which must not be permitted.

It is generally of great advantage to allow the skin of a fish to lie over night in spirits (two parts of ninety-five per cent alcohol to one of water) for the sake of curing and toughening the integument, and curing whatever particles of flesh may chance to remain in the skull.

After having removed the skin, it must be cleaned most carefully. With a keen-bladed knife, pare and scrape off all the adherent flesh from the skin, cut out the gills, and remove the flesh from the interior of the skull, and the base of the fins. Of course the eyes must come out also. With a stout pair of scissors trim off the projecting bases of the rays of the dorsal and anal fins, so that the fin itself may set squarely upon the top of the centre-board.

I will now describe, step by step, the entire process of mounting a fish by what I consider the simplest, easiest, and most practical method known. Be advised in the beginning, however, that you can not mount fishes on nice brass standards with nothing at all in the way of special materials and tools. You must have an assortment of hard brass wire, Nos. 3 to 10, a hack-saw, some brass rosettes, a small die for cutting threads on brass wire, and taps of corresponding sizes for cutting threads in the brass nuts and rosettes. The outfit is by no means expensive, but it is indispensable if you wish to mount your specimens on standards, and thus have them show off to the finest advantage.

1. Procure a piece of soft wood, pine preferred, and with the skinned body of the fish before you, whittle the wood down to the general shape of the body, but one-fourth smaller in actual size. In Plate IV. the outline a, b, c represents the wooden centre-board, which is really the foundation upon which the mounted specimen is to be constructed.

2. Prepare two small brass standards (e, e), and screw the upper end of each firmly into a gimlet-hole bored into the centre-board at d, d. At the lower end of each standard the thread should be cut for a little more than an inch of its length, and a turned brass rosette screwed on, to rest on top of the pedestal, and hold the rod from slipping down through the hole. Underneath the pedestal a square nut is screwed on tightly. These rods should be exactly perpendicular, and the axis of the fish (an imaginary line running lengthwise through the centre of the bulk), should be as nearly as possible horizontal. A fish mounted with its tail too high in the air seems to be taking a header, and when the reverse is the case, it suggests a ship sinking stern foremost.

3. Having thoroughly cleaned the inside of the skin, anoint it liberally with arsenical soap, or if you have not that, with a plentiful sprinkling of powdered arsenic.

4. For the fourth step—filling—I shall describe two very different processes, advising the beginner to make a fair trial of both, and then adopt the one he succeeds best with.

The filling which I infinitely prefer for a fish is clay and chopped tow, mixed together, and used as stiff as may be to work well. Clay which is too soft when used shrinks as the excess of water dries out of it, and is liable to leave an uneven surface. With a flat modeling-tool, coat the centre-board evenly with the clay until you have reproduced the form and size of the fleshy body of the fish. Then put the skin over this, press it down firmly to exclude all air-bubbles, working it from the back downward. When you find that the skin fits perfectly and without any drawing or straining, begin at the tail and sew the skin together, making, as you proceed, a perfect finish of the specimen. Draw the edges closely together, and the more perfectly the scales can be made to hide the opening the better.

The other filling process is to use fine, soft tow, chopped up finely. With a goodly quantity of tow before you, open the fish skin, and with your forceps insert a layer of tow all along the back, and also on the side which lies next to the table. Then put the centre-board in its place, while the skin still lies before you, and with the forceps distribute an equal quantity of tow between the upper side of the board and the skin. Thus a perfect and even cushion of tow is provided to lie between the skin and the board at all points save below. Begin at the tail, and with your needle and thread sew up the skin for an inch or two; then with your small forceps or filler, stuff to the right size and shape the portion that has been sewn up. That done, sew up another section, and stuff as before, proceeding thus until the head is reached and the entire fish has been filled and shaped. Notches must be cut in the skin at the points where the brass rods enter it.

All this time the fish has been kept wet so that the fins are soft and elastic, and the scales are perfectly smooth. The fins must now be spread, and each one enclosed between two bits of pasteboard cut to the right shape, and held firmly together by sticking pins through them around the edge of the fin. Do not on any account stick pins through the fins, or you will afterward have the trouble of filling up the pin-holes. Force the pins through the two thicknesses of pasteboard with your small pliers, and whatever may be the shape, or size, or position of a fin, you must so shape your pasteboard that the fin will be spread, and have the same position it would on a live fish.

6. The last thing at this stage is to mix together equal quantities of white varnish and turpentine, sponge off the fish carefully, removing every particle of clay, tow, or dirt, and varnish it all over. This prevents the scales from curling up when they dry, and it also goes far toward fixing the colors of the fish. The fins are to be varnished afterward when they get dry.

7. While the fish is drying, the eyes should be prepared. Every one knows that the eyes of different genera of fishes vary in shape, size, and color, to as great a degree as do the eyes of quadrupeds. For mounted specimens, one of two things may be done; insert a conventional silver or golden glass eye, or else keep on hand a lot of uncolored fish eyes, and paint each pair from nature, in oil colors of course, to suit the particular specimen it is to adorn. When the paint has had time to dry and harden, cover it with two or three coats of shellac to protect the colors from any changes which might be effected by the material in which the eye is to be set. If the coating of paint is left unprotected, it is very apt to undergo chemical changes, and the eye may thereby be ruined.

8. The eye may be set in clay or putty provided none of the setting material is to be exposed. If the glass eye is smaller than the opening, which is very often the case, set it in fine papier-machÉ, which must be nicely modeled around the glass, and afterward coated with shellac, and painted.

10. The subject of painting fishes will be considered in a separate chapter.

Simple as it may appear, and really is, the above processes may be applied with slight modifications to even the largest scale fishes, and to the sharks and saw-fishes. Such large subjects as the jewfish require strong iron rods for standards, and the skin may either be mounted over a manikin, made of excelsior tied down upon a central beam, or it may be stuffed with soft straw, which, considering the great thickness of the skin and scales, is quite satisfactory.

Mounting Fish Medallions.—A fish with but one side mounted and exhibited may be called a fish medallion. It may lie flat in a table-case, or be screwed to the back of an upright case, or it may even be set up on standards fastened to it at the back. As a specimen, either to prepare or exhibit, it has its advantages, and I will briefly describe my process.

We will suppose that our fish is a fresh subject, or an entire specimen from alcohol. The first thing is to procure a pine board of proper thickness, lay the fish flat upon it, and with a pencil mark out its outline. Although only one side of the fish is to show, it is desirable to mount a little more than precisely one-half of it. Therefore, select the side to be displayed, and remove the skin from the other to within a short distance of the median line of the back and abdomen. This extra margin of skin is to give the skin an appearance of entirety and rotundity, rather than flatness such as would be the case if an exact half were represented. The head of the fish must be sawn through with a fine saw, and, of course, the observance of the directions already given will leave the dorsal and anal fins on the portion to be exhibited.

Having carefully skinned, cleaned, and preserved the portion to be exhibited, the centre-board is cut out with a short bevel on the inside, and on the other the full shape of one side of the fish. When this fits the skin properly, the right quantity of clay is put upon it, the skin is then put on, and fastened at the back according to circumstances. With a small fish, the edges of the skin may be sewn together from top to bottom, across the exposed surface of the centre board, but with large specimens it is best to nail the edges to the board.

Mounting Cartilaginous Fishes: Sharks, rays, saw-fish, etc.—The only failures I have ever made during my thirteen years of taxidermic work have been with subjects of this class. I call them failures because, after taking infinite pains and mounting my specimens to the complete satisfaction of all concerned, the best ones, the very ones I had considered most perfect when finished, for two or three years afterward continued to shrink and shrink, until the skin burst open, and the tail and fins warped out of shape by the same process until it was maddening to look upon them.

I once spent a week of diligent labor in mounting over a clay-covered excelsior manikin the skin of a ten-and-a-half foot gray shark (Hexanchus griseus), which came to me in the flesh. It was a beautiful specimen, and I mounted it according to elaborate measurements, and a cast of the head. The result was all that could be desired. Three years later that shark was a sight to behold. Around the body, just back of the gill openings, the skin had burst open in a crack an inch wide. The tail had been ripped open by the terrible strain of shrinkage, so had the seam underneath the belly, and at first the damage seemed beyond repair. We did repair it, however, very fairly, but to me the specimen has ever since been an eyesore.

By the bitterest of experiences I have learned that a shark, ray, or saw-fish is bound to keep shrinking and shrinking, in both length and circumference, from the day it is finished to the crack of doom. The fins and tail will warp and twist out of shape, and I defy any man to prevent it. Since finding it impossible to mount a fish of this class substantially, and have it retain its original size, I have adopted a plan which allows shrinkage. The rod which supports the tail is fastened to the centre-board by two staples so loosely that when the strain of shrinkage comes upon it, it will gradually slip through the staples and allow the specimen to shorten instead of bursting.

It is best not to mount a shark too well. Stuff it with soft straw instead of making a firm manikin, and do not fill the body any harder than is necessary to secure smoothness. As the specimen gets old, and its circumference grows smaller by degrees, and beautifully (?) less, the mass of straw will also shrink to accommodate the lawless tendencies of the skin.

I have successively tried the effect of curing skins of sharks in brine, in alcohol, and in the salt-and-alum bath, but the result is always the same. It is easy enough to mount them to perfection, but to make them remain as mounted for five years is beyond my powers.

The rays are the meanest of all subjects that vex the soul of the taxidermist. Shun them as you would the small-pox or the devil. Such abominable animated pancakes, with razor edges that taper out to infinite nothingness, were never made to be mounted by any process known to mortal man. To mount the skin of a vile ray, and make it really perfect and life-like is to invite infinite shrinkage, rips, tears, warps, defeat, and humiliation at the hands of your envious rivals. If you must mount a ray, by all means get square with it at the start. Stuff his miserable old skin with tow or straw, the more the better. Ram him, cram him "full to the very jaws," like the famous rattlesnake skin that taxidermist Miles Standish stuffed "with powder and bullets." If you can burst him wide open from head to tail, by all means do so, and you may call me your slave for the rest of my life. Make him nice and round, like a balloon, and then no matter what he does afterward to mortify and disgrace you, and to drag your fair standard in the dust, you will always have the satisfaction of knowing you are square with him.

Once when I was young and innocent, I encountered an enormous ray. He was not thrust upon me, for I achieved him—and my own ruin also, at one fell stroke. I mounted him willingly, nay, eagerly, as PhÆton mounted his chariot, to show the rest of the world how all rays should be done. I mounted his vast, expansive skin over a clay-covered manikin that had edges like a Damascus razor, and I made him flat. He was flat enough to navigate the Platte River at low water, which even a thick shingle can not do. He was life-like, and likewise was a great triumph. But almost the moment my back was turned upon him forever, he went back on me. I had put him up to stay put, so far as my part was concerned, so he just got mad and literally tore himself to tatters. He became almost a total wreck, and to make my defeat a more genuine and unmitigated crusher, Professor Ward sent word to me, all the way to Washington, that he would sell me that large ray for $5. I never forgave him for that.

The best way to mount a ray is to make a nice plaster cast of it, paint it, and then bury the accursed ray in a compost heap. As a class these fishes are remarkable, and highly interesting, and there is a far greater variety of them than anyone who is not an ichthyologist might suppose. To me there is no other group of fishes more interesting, and, I may add, there is no other group that is, as a general thing, so poorly represented in museum collections. They exhibit all possible intermediate forms between the ordinary shark and the perfectly round, flat ray. The intermediate forms, Rhynobatii and Rhamphobatis, are naturally the most interesting.