To Make Pictures Of Birds With Their Natural Feathers
First take thin board or panel, of deal or wainscot, well seasoned,
that it may not shrink; then paste white paper smoothly on it, and
let it dry; if the colour of the wood show through, paste a second
paper over it. When the paper is dry, get ready any bird that you
would represent, and draw the outline as exact as you can on the
papered panel. You then paint the ground-work, stump of a tree, the
bill and legs, their
roper colour, with water-colours, leaving the
body to be covered with its own natural feathers. In the space you
have left for the body, you lay on very thick gum-water, letting each
coat dry before you lay on another, and so continuing until the gum is
as thick as a shilling. Then take the feathers off the bird; and, as
you proceed, draw a camels'-hair pencil, dipped in gum-water, over the
coat of gum that you have laid on the paper, that it may more readily
adhere. As you strip the bird, you must fix the feathers in their
proper places on the board, and you shave the shafts or stems of the
larger feathers, that they may lie flat. The most ready way to perform
the operation, is to provide yourself with a pair of steel pliars to
take up and lay on the feathers with. You should prepare some small
leaden weights to lay on the feathers, that they may more readily
adhere to, and lie flat on, the gum. The part where the eye is must be
supplied by a small piece of paper, coloured and shaped like one; or
you may, probably, be able to get a glass bead that will answer the
purpose better. In order that the feathers may lie smooth and regular,
when the whole is perfectly dry, lay a book, or a flat board, with a
weight on it.