THE TRIUMPHS OF A TAXIDERMIST
Here are some of the secrets of taxidermy. They were told me by thetaxidermist in a mood of elation. He told me them in the time betweenthe first glass of whisky and the fourth, when a man is no longercautious and yet not drunk. We sat in his den together; his library itwas, his sitting and his eating-room--separated by a bead curtain, sofar as the sense of sight went, from the noisome den where he pliedhis trade.
He sat on a deck chair, and when he was not tapping refractory bits ofcoal with them, he kept his feet--on which he wore, after the mannerof sandals, the holy relics of a pair of carpet slippers--out of theway upon the mantel-piece, among the glass eyes. And his trousers,by-the-by--though they have nothing to do with his triumphs--were amost horrible yellow plaid, such as they made when our fathers woreside-whiskers and there were crinolines in the land. Further, his hairwas black, his face rosy, and his eye a fiery brown; and his coat waschiefly of grease upon a basis of velveteen. And his pipe had a bowlof china showing the Graces, and his spectacles were always askew, theleft eye glaring nakedly at you, small and penetrating; the right,seen through a glass darkly, magnified and mild. Thus his discourseran: "There never was a man who could stuff like me, Bellows, never. Ihave stuffed elephants and I have stuffed moths, and the things havelooked all the livelier and better for it. And I have stuffed humanbeings--chiefly amateur ornithologists. But I stuffed a nigger once.
"No, there is no law against it. I made him with all his fingers outand used him as a hat-rack, but that fool Homersby got up a quarrelwith him late one night and spoilt him. That was before your time. Itis hard to get skins, or I would have another.
"Unpleasant? I don't see it. Seems to me taxidermy is a promisingthird course to burial or cremation. You could keep all your dear onesby you. Bric-a-brac of that sort stuck about the house would be asgood as most company, and much less expensive. You might have themfitted up with clockwork to do things.
"Of course they would have to be varnished, but they need not shinemore than lots of people do naturally. Old Manningtree's bald head....Anyhow, you could talk to them without interruption. Even aunts. Thereis a great future before taxidermy, depend upon it. There is fossilsagain...."
He suddenly became silent.
"No, I don't think I ought to tell you that." He sucked at his pipethoughtfully. "Thanks, yes. Not too much water.
"Of course, what I tell you now will go no further. You know I havemade some dodos and a great auk? No! Evidently you are an amateur attaxidermy. My dear fellow, half the great auks in the world are aboutas genuine as the handkerchief of Saint Veronica, as the Holy Coat ofTreves. We make 'em of grebes' feathers and the like. And the greatauk's eggs too!"
"Good heavens!"
"Yes, we make them out of fine porcelain. I tell you it is worthwhile. They fetch--one fetched L300 only the other day. That one wasreally genuine, I believe, but of course one is never certain. It isvery fine work, and afterwards you have to get them dusty, for no onewho owns one of these precious eggs has ever the temerity to clean thething. That's the beauty of the business. Even if they suspect an eggthey do not like to examine it too closely. It's such brittle capitalat the best.
"You did not know that taxidermy rose to heights like that. My boy, ithas risen higher. I have rivalled the hands of Nature herself. One ofthe _genuine_ great auks"--his voice fell to a whisper--one of the_genuine_ great auks _was made by me_."
"No. You must study ornithology, and find out which it is yourself.And what is more, I have been approached by a syndicate of dealersto stock one of the unexplored skerries to the north of Iceland withspecimens. I may--some day. But I have another little thing in handjust now. Ever heard of the dinornis?
"It is one of those big birds recently extinct in New Zealand. 'Moa'is its common name, so called because extinct: there is no moa now.See? Well, they have got bones of it, and from some of the marsheseven feathers and dried bits of skin. Now, I am going to--well, thereis no need to make any bones about it--going to _forge_ a completestuffed moa. I know a chap out there who will pretend to make the findin a kind of antiseptic swamp, and say he stuffed it at once, as itthreatened to fall to pieces. The feathers are peculiar, but I havegot a simply lovely way of dodging up singed bits of ostrich plume.Yes, that is the new smell you noticed. They can only discover thefraud with a microscope, and they will hardly care to pull a nicespecimen to bits for that.
"In this way, you see, I give my little push in the advancement ofscience.
"But all this is merely imitating Nature. I have done more than thatin my time. I have--beaten her."
He took his feet down from the mantel-board, and leant overconfidentially towards me. "I have _created_ birds," he said in a lowvoice. "_New_ birds. Improvements. Like no birds that was ever seenbefore."
He resumed his attitude during an impressive silence.
"Enrich the universe; _rath_-er. Some of the birds I made were newkinds of humming birds, and very beautiful little things, but some ofthem were simply rum. The rummest, I think, was the _AnomalopteryxJejuna. Jejunus-a-um_--empty--so called because there was reallynothing in it; a thoroughly empty bird--except for stuffing. OldJavvers has the thing now, and I suppose he is almost as proud of itas I am. It is a masterpiece, Bellows. It has all the silly clumsinessof your pelican, all the solemn want of dignity of your parrot,all the gaunt ungainliness of a flamingo, with all the extravagantchromatic conflict of a mandarin duck. _Such_ a bird. I made it outof the skeletons of a stork and a toucan and a job lot of feathers.Taxidermy of that kind is just pure joy, Bellows, to a real artist inthe art.
"How did I come to make it? Simple enough, as all great inventionsare. One of those young genii who write us Science Notes in the papersgot hold of a German pamphlet about the birds of New Zealand, andtranslated some of it by means of a dictionary and his mother-wit--hemust have been one of a very large family with a small mother--and hegot mixed between the living apteryx and the extinct anomalopteryx;talked about a bird five feet high, living in the jungles of the NorthIsland, rare, shy, specimens difficult to obtain, and so on. Javvers,who even for a collector, is a miraculously ignorant man, read theseparagraphs, and swore he would have the thing at any price. Raidedthe dealers with enquiries. It shows what a man can do bypersistence--will-power. Here was a bird-collector swearing he wouldhave a specimen of a bird that did not exist, that never had existed,and which for very shame of its own profane ungainliness, probablywould not exist now if it could help itself. And he got it. _He gotit_."
"Have some more whisky, Bellows?" said the taxidermist, rousinghimself from a transient contemplation of the mysteries of will-powerand the collecting turn of mind. And, replenished, he proceeded totell me of how he concocted a most attractive mermaid, and how anitinerant preacher, who could not get an audience because of it,smashed it because it was idolatry, or worse, at Burslem Wakes. Butas the conversation of all the parties to this transaction,creator, would-be preserver, and destroyer, was uniformly unfit forpublication, this cheerful incident must still remain unprinted.
The reader unacquainted with the dark ways of the collector mayperhaps be inclined to doubt my taxidermist, but so far as great auks'eggs, and the bogus stuffed birds are concerned, I find that he hasthe confirmation of distinguished ornithological writers. And the noteabout the New Zealand bird certainly appeared in a morning paper ofunblemished reputation, for the Taxidermist keeps a copy and has shownit to me.