us, we return, ever richly laden, sometimes
with the carcass of an eagle, or it may be of an African Phenicopterus;
or, failing in such large game, we are tolerably sure of porcupines, fine
snakes, a nest of vipers, specimens of our three several kinds of
tortoises, and different species of land crabs; to say nothing of the
Tarantulas, Scholias, and Hippobosques, which I pin round my bonnet, or
pop into spirits of wine. As to stuffing--the witnessing how some, who
call themselves naturalists, stuff birds, has been long as a beacon to me!
They really seem to forget, that it is one thing to prepare a goose for
the spit, and another to fill his skin for the museum; they cram whatever
they have in hand, as Fuocista Beppo crams a sky-rocket to repletion. Few
take the natural shape as a model for the embalmed body. In such hands,
sparrows become linnets, owls appear to have died of apoplexy, kestril
eyes shine in Civetta's sockets, and the jackdaw has a pupil like the
vulture. Then in grouping, they make _all_ to look straight forward, as
if, when a hawk has swooped upon a teal, his eyes did not turn downwards
in the direction of his victim, or those of the poor teal upwards, in the
direction of the expected blow; _he_ too, should be represented as
striving to extend his neck beyond the drooping screen of the other's
impenetrable wing. Then birds of prey should not perch like barn-door
fowls, nor a parrot divide his toes before and behind unequally; yet some
taxidermists there are, who consider these things _trifles_!" "Well, sir,
what do you think of my daughter's stuffing?" said the old woman. "Why,
that she stuffs beautifully, but the smell of those old hides in the
corner makes me sick." Whereupon they both laughed out at our affectation.
"A doctor, and made sick!" said they, and they laughed again. "Have you
heard of the Brazilian consul's lion?" interrogated the daughter,
endeavouring to make us forget our sickness by exciting our curiosity.
"No; nor even that he had a lion." "Oh, tell the story to the Signor
Dottore, mother!" said the girl; "I can't for laughing." Upon which the
old woman, summoning to her aid a ludicrously solemn look, prefaced the
anecdote by supposing "We must know the Brazilian consul?"--"Not even by
name."--"In that case we were to understand that he was by nature a man of
great tenderness of character, but had once been chafed into an act of
extraordinary ferocity, killing with his own hand, during