Part 8 (1/2)

Dental formula: Inc., 0/4; can., 1--1/1--1; pre-m., 2--2/2--2; molars, 3--3/3--3.

NO. 36. MEGADERMA LYRA.

_The Large-eared Vampire Bat_ (_Jerdon's No. 15_).

HABITAT.--India and Ceylon.

[Figure: _Megaderma lyra_.]

DESCRIPTION.--Above ashy blue, slaty or pale mouse colour; albescent or yellowish ashy beneath; nasal appendage large, oblong, free at the tip, reaching to the base of the ears with a fold down the centre; tragus (_oreillon_) cordate, two-lobed, anterior long, narrow and pointed, posterior lobe half the height and rounded; muzzle truncated; under-lip cleft; wing membranes dark brown.

SIZE.--Head and body, 3 or 3-1/2 inches; wing extent, 14 to 19 inches.

Very abundant in old buildings. They are beyond doubt blood-suckers.

Blyth noticed one fly into his room one evening with a small _vespertilio_, which it dropped on being chased. The smaller bat was weak from loss of blood, and next morning (the Megaderm having been caught), on both bats being put into the same cage, the little one was again attacked and devoured; it was seized both times behind the ear. McMaster writes that in Rangoon he had a tame canary killed by a bat, and the bird's mate soon afterwards was destroyed in the same way. The case was clearly proved.

Mr. Frith informed Mr. Blyth that these bats were in the habit of resorting to the verandah of his house at Mymensing, and that every morning the ground under them was strewed with the hind quarters of frogs, and the wings of large gra.s.shoppers and crickets. On one occasion the remains of a small fish were observed; but frogs appeared to be their chief diet--never toads; and of a quiet evening these animals could be distinctly heard crunching the heads and smaller bones of their victims.

NO. 37. MEGADERMA SPECTRUM.

_The Cashmere Vampire_ (_Jerdon's No. 16_).

HABITAT.--Cashmere.

DESCRIPTION.--Above slaty cinereous, whitish beneath; the vertical nose-leaf of moderate size, oval; inner lobe of tragus ovate (_Jerdon_).

SIZE.--Two and three-quarter inches.

Dobson makes this bat synonymous with the last.

NO. 38. MEGADERMA SPASMA.

HABITAT.--Tena.s.serim, Ceylon.

[Figure: _Megaderma spasma_.]

DESCRIPTION.--Muzzle, ear-conch, and tragus similar to those of _M.

lyra_; the posterior portion of the tragus, however, is longer and more attenuated upwards, and more acutely pointed; the nose-leaf is shorter, with convex sides; but the anterior concave disc is considerably larger, and the base of the thickened process is cordate; thumbs and wings as in _M. lyra_; interfemoral membrane deeper; the calcaneum stronger; colour the same.

SIZE.--Head and body, about 3 inches. This bat is alluded to by Jerdon as _M. Horsfieldii_.

RHINOLOPHINAE.

Nasal leaf complicated, and crests resting on the forehead, presenting more or less the figure of a horse-shoe; tail long and placed in the interfemoral membrane; ears large, but separate, and not joined at the base, as in the last genus; without a tragus, but often with a lobe at the base of the outer margin; wings large and long; forefinger of a single joint.

_GENUS RHINOLOPHUS_.