The simplest method of skeletonising an animal's skull is to boil the skull until all the flesh can be easily removed with pieces of blunt wood; but steaming the skull would be better if it could be arranged; these methods are liable to make the bones very greasy-looking. Another method, though very disgusting, is to macerate the skull in cold water, and, when the flesh has putrefied, to sci-ape and scrub the bones until clean. The whole can then be whitened by soaking for about six hours in 1 gal. of water to which has been added 2 oz. or 3oz. of chloride of lime. The skull may be soaked in water until the flesh and fibres are soft enough to be scraped off. Special bone-scrapers are used by professional osteologists, but for a single specimen a penknife would suffice. The dirt can be removed by well scrubbing with plenty of soap and soda, combined with the scraping; and if, after soaking in the chloride of lime solution, the result is not satisfactory, wet the skull every morning and evening, and leave it exposed to the sun and wind until bleached.

Two things should be remembered - every particle of flesh, skin, etc., must be removed; also, the scraping, having been commenced, must be finished, or the skull placed back in the water.