If the feathers get soiled with grease, blood and dirt, wash the plumage with clean turpentine and a soft tooth-brush, apply an abundance of plaster Paris, rub it into the feathers, and immediately beat it out with a supple switch, or piece of stiff wire of proper size. If you have not these materials, wash the feathers with warm water and a little soap, and dry as best you can, according to what you have. Manipulate the feathers while they are drying and they will come out soft and fluffy as in life; but if left to dry without this, they will remain in a bedraggled, soaked, and stringy condition. This subject will be fully considered in a separate chapter (XXV.).
In making up the skin of a duck or goose, a piece of wire must be put into the neck, with the tow or other filling wrapped around it, or failing that, the neck filling must be wrapped around a small stick, the upper end of which is to be thrust forcibly into the skull. The head is large and heavy, and the neck is very small, so small that the skin will break in two if there is not a wire or stick run through the body and neck into the head to support the latter when the skin is being handled. The feet of all web-footed birds should be spread while drying.
ALECTORIDES: _The Cranes and Herodiones_.--There is but little to add in regard to birds of either of these orders. The cranes require a slit in the skin at the back of the head, but the herons do not. The necks of the latter are very often filled too full in making up a skin, and the neck filling is often made round, whereas it should always be _flat_, like the actual neck of the heron or bittern. It is not necessary to remove the tendons from the legs of the small herons, ibises, etc., but the legs should always be bent up and the feet disposed of on the body. The feet and legs of all the above must be treated to a coat of thin arsenical soap, for the benefit of insect pests.
OPHIDIÆ: _Serpents_.--All the small and medium-sized serpents should be preserved entire in good, clean, ninety-five per cent alcohol, diluted with one-half its own bulk of water. If the spirits is not as strong as ninety-five per cent., then dilute with one-third water instead of one-half. There should be from two to four incisions made along the median line of the belly, each one a few inches in length, to make openings through which the spirits can reach the abdominal region. Give the specimen plenty of room until it is thoroughly penetrated with the alcohol.