180 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



recorded. It is noticeable that many of the better known species are 

 cave haunters, and so are rather easily taken, once their caverns are 

 discovered. The tree-dwelling bats, however, must usually be shot 

 or captured as occasional chance may offer. Our knowledge of the 

 distribution, especially of this latter class, is still therefore far from 

 complete. For this reason the negative evidence as to the apparent 

 absence of certain species must not be too strongly insisted upon. 

 A singular instance is that of Lonchorhina aurita, originally described 

 from a specimen without locality. Of the two additional specimens 

 discovered in the fifty years since the first was made known, one came 

 from Venezuela, and the second from Nassau Harbor, New Providence, 

 Bahamas. The possible agency of a steam vessel might here be 

 invoked, though the evidence at present points to the occurrence of 

 the genus in the Lesser Antilles as well. 



The apparent absence of certain genera is, however, very noticeable. 

 Thus, there is no evidence that Pipistrellus or Dasypterus occurs 

 anywhere in the West Indies. The widespread genus Myotis is 

 apparently quite absent from the Greater Antilles, although in the 

 Lesser Antilles a representative of the austral species M. nigricans 

 is described from Dominica. The genus Rhogeessa is perhaps to be 

 looked for in Jamaica or Cuba, as it occurs on the neighboring main- 

 land. Of the Emballonuridae, no representatives of Rhynchiscus, 

 Saccopteryx, Balantiopteryx, Diclidurus, and certain rarer genera are 

 known. Of common Central American Phyllostomidae, no record 

 appears for Micronycteris, Tonatia, Phyllostomus, Anoura, Vampy- 

 rops, Chiroderma, the subgenus Dermanura of Artibeus; the Desmo- 

 dontidae also seem to be unrepresented, as well as the Furipteridae 

 and Thyropteridae. 



Of the thirty-one genera of bats now known from the West Indies, 

 no less than ten are peculiar to Antillea. Of these ten, three are 

 represented in both the Greater and the Lesser Antilles, viz., Mono- 

 phyllus, Brachyphylla, and Ardops. The remaining seven so far as 

 known are all peculiar to the Greater Antilles (including the Bahamas). 

 These are Phyllonycteris, Reithronycteris, Phyllops, Ariteus, Erophylla, 

 Chilonatalus, and Nyctiellus. These and other genera will be severally 

 discussed below. It is interesting to observe that no genus of bats 

 peculiar to the Lesser Antilles has been discovered, although our 

 knowledge of the Chiroptera of these islands is still far from complete, 

 — so much so, indeed, that practically nothing is known of the bat 

 fauna of most of them. 



Of species whose distribution throughout the Antilles is rather 



