Arsenical soaps and corrosive sublimate (HgCl₂) were frequently used in taxidermy to prevent infestation of specimens in museum collections. These substances were also used, to a much lesser extent, in the treatment of ethnographic material such as blankets, fur and leather objects. For safety considerations, it is desirable for museums and conservators to test suspected objects for the presence of these elements. A quick, non-destructive technique which can be used for this is radioisotope excited x-ray energy spectrometry. A typical analysis takes only between 200-300 seconds, and is able to detect arsenic present on the inside of the skin in large amounts, or on the outside of the specimen. Spot tests, which use scrapings of residues or cuttings of fur and feathers to test for arsenic or mercury, can also be used. However, they may be subject to interferences from other elements. Also, unrepresented samples may give negative results for a contaminated specimen. The ease with which arsenic may be removed from a specimen and transferred to the surroundings is also a concern. For example, it has been mentioned in the literature that arsenic may work its way from the skin up into the fur and feathers of the specimens and be present as a fine dust at the ends of the fibers. To examine this aspect, samples of fur, skin and feathers from some of the specimens containing major amounts of arsenic were analyzed using a scanning electron microscope equipped with an x-ray energy spectrometer. Major amounts of arsenic were detected on the inside of the skin, and smaller amounts were detected in the fur or feathers, but not as a dust. -- CAL