Taxidermy and Zoological Collecting / A Complete Handbook for the Amateur Taxidermist, Collector, Osteologist, Museum-Builder, Sportsman, and Traveller

THE EXPEDITION AND ITS OBJECT.

The author relates the experiences of a hunter and naturalist in India, Ceylon, the Malay Peninsula, and Borneo; and certainly no richer hunting-ground could be found anywhere else in the world. Mr. Hornaday is chief taxidermist in the United States National Museum. He was formerly connected with Professor Ward's Natural Science Museum of Rochester, N.Y., and his expedition to the East was in the interests of that establishment. While his book is in some respects like such works as those which Du Chaillu and Sir Samuel W. Baker have written to delight and interest a multitude of readers, he has imparted a vast amount of information, a large part of which is new and of the greatest moment to the naturalist.

Mr. Hornaday started from New York in 1876. From England he went finally south to India, arriving at Bombay; he went across country to Benares; from here he made an expedition to the north to Cawnpore and Agra. From Benares he worked his way to Calcutta, journeyed down the Bay of Bengal to Madras; southward again, he made a complete circuit of Ceylon, than to the Malay Peninsula, and finally to Borneo, where his adventures with the oran-gutan were met, ending his two years of fruitful and entirely successful search. The illustrations are many, and most of them are taken from Mr. Hornaday's own sketches. Though it may seem to be stating much, it certainly may be truly said that a more interesting book of travel and adventures was never published.

"Decidedly the most interesting and instructive book of travel and adventure in the East Indies it has ever been our good fortune to read."—Baltimore News.
"An entertaining volume.... The author has proved his ability to write a good book of travel."—Morning Post (London).
"To the naturalist, Mr. Hornaday's book cannot but be as deeply interesting as to the sportsman and traveller.... It deserved to be distinguished from among the mass of books of sporting adventure."—Melbourne Argus.
"One of the most entertaining and instructive books of its kind that has been published."—San Francisco Post.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] For further particulars, see Two Years in the Jungle. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

[2] For No. 22 use wood powder and a gun-cane. It makes no noise, does not frighten the little birds and mammals, and, if you are wicked enough, you can use it on Sunday.

[3] See recipe in Chapter XLV.

[4] For detailed instructions in skinning large heads, see Chapter XIX.

[5] From Steele's Popular Zoology, by permission of the American Book Company.

[6] Some operators open a fish in a straight line along the middle of one side, but I have never been able to see any reason for this preference.

[7] For the best part of the information given under this heading I am indebted to Mr. I. Greegor, the well-known dealer in sea-shells and Florida "curios," at 61 Laura Street, Jacksonville, Fla., who is an acknowledged expert in the treatment of shells, not only in cleaning, but in cutting sections, polishing, etc. I obtained the facts from him while he occupied a very high position in the Smithsonian Institution—in the north tower, at least fifty feet from the ground.

[8] If you can not procure annealed wire, take hard iron wire, heat it to redness, and as soon as it reaches that state remove it from the fire and allow it to cool slowly.

[9] This specimen received the silver specialty medal awarded "for the best piece in entire Exhibition," at the New York Exhibition of the Society of American Taxidermists, in 1883.

[10] At the hoof in the case of all hoofed animals.

[11] The cyanide cake is made by pouring plaster of Paris into a mould of proper size and imbedding in it before setting a number of lumps of cyanide of potash.

[12] Made and sold by Blake & Co., Philadelphia.

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