676 



CHIROPTERA 



Fig. 321. — Head of Centurio senex. 

 (Dobson, Cat. Ch Vropt. Brit. Mus.) 



the skull and teeth. Artibeus, with six sj)ecies, includes the well- 

 known frugivorous Bat, A. perspicillatus. Waterton believed that 

 A. planirostris, a common Bat in British Guiana, usually found in 

 the roofs of houses, and now known to be frugivorous, was the true 

 blood-sucking Vampire. Stenoderma achradophilvm, found in Jamaica 

 and Cuba, associated with Artibeus perspicillatus, from which it is 

 scarcely distinguishable externally except by its much smaller size, 

 differs altogether in the absence of the horizontal plate of the 



palatal bones. Sturnira lilium, while 

 agreeing with the above in the form of 

 the nose-leaf and ears, differs from all 

 the species of the family in its longi- 

 tudinally-grooved molars, which resemble 

 those of the Pteropodidce more closely than 

 those of any other Bats; and the presence 

 of tufts of long differently coloured hairs 

 over glands in the sides of the neck shows 

 another common character still more 

 remarkable, which can scarcely be con- 

 sidered the result of adaptive change. Centurio senex is the type 

 of a genus distinguished from Stenoderma and other genera of this 

 division by the absence of a distinct nose-leaf ; its facial aspect, as 

 shown in Fig. 321, is altogether bizarre. 



In the last or Besmodont division the muzzle is conical and 

 short ; there is a distinct nose-leaf ; the interfemoral membrane is 

 very short; and the tail is wanting. Dentition: i -}, c ^, p> %, 

 m ~o > total 24 or 20. Upper incisors very large, trenchant, 

 occupying the whole space between the canines ; premolars very 

 narrow, with sharp-edged longitudinal crowns ; molars rudimentary 

 or wanting; stomach greatly elongated, intestiniform. There are only 

 two genera, the single species of each of which are the true blood- 

 sucking Vampires. They appear to be confined chiefly to the 

 forest-clad parts, and their attacks on men and other warm-blooded 

 animals were noticed by some of the earliest writers. Thus Peter 

 Martyr (Anghiera), who wrote soon after the conquest of South 

 America, says that in the Isthmus of Darien there were Bats Avhich 

 sucked the blood of men and cattle when asleep to such a degree 

 as to kill them. Condamine, a writer of the eighteenth century, 

 remarks that at Borja (Ecuador) and in other places they had 

 entirely destroyed the cattle introduced by the missionaries. Sir 

 Robert Schomburgk relates that at Wicki, on the river Berbice, no 

 fowls could be kept on account of the ravages of these creatures, 

 which attacked their combs, causing them to appear white from loss 

 of blood. Although these Bats were known thus early to Europeans, 

 the species to which they belonged were not determined until about 

 sixty years ago, several of the large frugivorous species having been 



