112 THE FLYING FOX, OR ROUSSETTE. 



fectly insensible to the shrill cries, which seemed to pierce into the brain like so many needles. 

 It is also known that many ears are deaf to the stridulous call of the grasshoppers. 



One use of the tail is, evidently, that it should act as a rudder, in order to guide the flight 

 while the creature is on the wing. There is, however, another purpose which it serves, and 

 which would never have been discovered, had not the bat been watched. It seems that the 

 female bat uses its tail, and the membrane which stretches on either side from the tail to the 

 hind legs, as a cradle, in which to deposit its young when newly born and comparatively 

 helpless. 



Bats are generally found to assemble in great numbers wherever they find a convenient 

 resting-place, and in such localities as church towers, rocky caverns, hollow trees, and the 

 like, they may be found by the hundred together. These numerous assemblies are the cause 

 of a large deposition of guano, which consists almost wholly of the refuse of insects, such as 

 wings, legs, and the harder coverings. In this guano are found, by the aid of the microscope, 

 very many curious infusorial objects, which may be separated from the guano by the usual 

 modes of preparation. 



The odor which arises from this substance is peculiarly sharp and pungent, and cannot 

 easily be mistaken. The animals themselves are readily alarmed when disturbed in their 

 home ; they disengage themselves from their perches, and flap about in great dismay, knocking 

 themselves against the intruder's face, much as the great nocturnal beetles are wont to do on 

 summer's evenings. A visit to a bat-cave is, therefore, no pleasant affair. 



The bats which have heretofore been mentioned feed on animal substances, insects appear- 

 ing to afford the principal nutriment, and raw meat or fresh blood being their occasional 

 luxuries. But the bats of which the Flying Fox is an example, are chiefly vegetable feeders, 

 and, in their own land, are most mischievous among the fruit-trees. 



They are the largest of the present bat tribe, some of them measuring nearly five feet in 

 expanse of wing. Their popular name is FLYING FOXES, a term which has been applied to 

 them on account of the red, fox-like color of the fur, and the very vulpine aspect of the 

 ' head. Although so superior in size to the Vampires, the Flying Foxes are not to be 

 dreaded as personal enemies, for, unless roughly handled, they are not given to biting ani- 

 mated beings. 



But though their attacks are not made directly upon animal life, they are of considerable 

 importance in an indirect point of view, for they are aimed against the fruits and other vegeta- 

 ble substances by which animal life is sustained. Figs and other soft fruits appear to be the 

 principal food of these bats ; and so pertinacious are the animals in their assaults on the crops, 

 whether of field or tree, that they are held in no small dread by the agriculturist. 



It is no easy matter to guard against .such foes as these winged devourers, for as the air 

 is an ever open path by which they can proceed on their destructive quest, and the darkness 

 of night shields them from watchful eyes, the ordinary precautions which are taken against 

 marauders would be useless. 



There are but two alternatives for any one who desires to partake of the fruit which he 

 has cherished the one, to cover the whole tree with netting or similar fencing, and the other, 

 to enclose each separate fruit-cluster with a sufficient protection. As the trees which the 

 Kalongs, as these bats are often called, most affect, are of considerable size, the latter plan is 

 that which is generally pursued. For this purpose, the natives weave from the split branches 

 of the bamboo, certain basket-like armor, which is fastened round the fruit as it approaches 

 maturity, and is an effectual guard even against the Kalong's teeth. 



When the trees are small, they are sometimes covered entirely with netting, but not to 

 such good purpose as when each fruit is separately protected. For these bats are so cunning, 

 that they creep under the nets and render nugatory all the precautions which have been taken. 

 One proprietor of a garden at Perriambuco was never able to secure a single fig from his trees, 

 in spite of nets by night and guns by day. The bats are wise animals, and do not meddle 

 with unripe fruit. 



The flight of these creatures is unlike that of the more active insect-feeding Cheiroptera. 

 The stroke of the wings is slow and steady, and instead of the devious course which charac- 



