Zoological Society. 427 



ing I smoked the cavity again, using the fumes of burning nitre and 

 sulphur, but entirely without success. I hence inferred that they 

 had deserted the tree as a dwelling on the first molestation. After 

 some months, however, I again found it tenanted by the same species, 

 if not the same individuals, and succeeded in obtaining another spe- 

 cimen, whose manners in captivity were identical with those recorded 

 above. 



"I have never seen the species abroad (so as to identify it), but 

 my intelligent negro lad, Sam, observed two about noon on the 16th 

 of April, the sun shining vertically. It was at a provision-ground at 

 Belmont, where they were clinging to the limb of a young Avo9ada 

 Pear (Persea). A Banana-bird (Icterus leucopteryx) was flying to- 

 wards them, apparently with the intention of pecking them, on whose 

 approach they flew away in different directions. The lad did not 

 perceive them until the very moment of separation and flight, but he 

 noticed that they were in actual contact, though he could not tell 

 their position. No hole or hollow tree was near. Could they have 

 been in copuld ? " 



I conjecture that it is the present species to which reference is 

 made in the following paragraph, which appeared in the Salisbury 

 Journal of February 6th, 1847 : — ' Mr. Thomas Dickon, an eminent 

 farmer in Lincolnshire, had been induced to go to Jamaica, as ma- 

 nager of some extensive estates there, with the intention of intro- 

 ducing the best systems of farming where they had been hitherto 

 unknown. Accounts have been received, that there is already every 

 probability of a considerable increase of sugar being produced by 

 applying a new guano as tillage. It is the dung of large bats. The 

 bats are said to amount to myriads ; and Mr. D. having observed 

 many of these singular animals entering the crevices of one of the 

 numerous rocks, caused an opening to be made and the place ex- 

 plored. The cave was found to be 250 feet long, 20 feet broad, and 

 from 20 to 30 feet high. The interior contained thousands of these 

 animals, and appeared to have been their dwelling for ages. At the 

 bottom of the cave, bats' dung, at least four feet in thickness, and 

 amounting to about 600 tons in weight, was discovered, and found 

 to be equal to the best Ichaboe guano.' 



I sent a copy of the above notice to my esteemed friend Richard 

 Hill, Esq., of Spanish Town, who thus replied : * I know Mr. Dickon, 

 to whom your newspaper paragraph relates. He details his expe- 

 rience in the parish of Westmoreland [the same part of Jamaica as 

 that in which my own observations were made. — P.H.G.]; I will how- 

 ever endeavour to ascertain the precise locality in which he had 

 discovered his extraordinary colony of bats. The Council of the 

 Royal Agricultural Society of Jamaica, of which I am a member, had 

 had its attention called to the manure to be obtained from faecal de- 

 posits in caves frequented by bats, and they had analysed the mate- 

 rial, but found it so largely charged with the comminuted wing- 

 cases of insects, and so little acted upon by decomposition, that the 

 azotized ingredients combined but slowly as a fertilizer. Several 



30* 



