WITH a circus folder or animal book for a copy, a few old cigar boxes, and a jack knife, a very lively and life-like menagerie can be made.
Cut the cigar boxes apart, and sandpaper the pieces very smooth. Then take a pencil and sketch as well as you can the animals in the pictures—at least the bodies of them, for the legs are to be attached afterward, so that they can stand and “do things.”
The cutting must be done very, very carefully, for the outlines make so many different angles with the grain of the wood. It is not in the least like straight cutting with the grain, or even straight cross-cutting, and the wood has an irritating habit of splitting off some vital part of the animal’s anatomy.
It is impossible to make the tails out of wood, so they are made of heavy string, glued in place. For the monkey, you can make a tail of wire, so that he can swing by it.
Patterns of Hippo and Tiger.
WHITTLED WILD ANIMALS
Giraffe, Camel
Patterns of Monkey and Giraffe.
Patterns of Bear and Lion.
WHITTLED WILD ANIMALS
Bear, Lion, “Darwin”
Make the legs of the animals separately and fasten them on to the bodies with tiny nails. Place the two fore legs or two hind legs in position on either side of the body piece, and drive through them a short wire nail, a very little longer than is necessary to go through the three thicknesses of wood. Then rest the head of the nail on a piece of iron, and hammer the point, forming a little rivet to pivot the legs. The feet must also be made separately, and fastened on in the same way, so that, whatever position the legs are in, the feet will remain level.