CREATURES OF DARKNESS 221 



tions too fine for human perception. Thus a bat is able to cap- 

 ture insects in mid-air or find its way on a dark night through 

 a forest of entwining twigs. 



A bat is the very essence of nocturnaHsm. It is also one of 

 the most remarkable animals in existence. The western world 

 regards the bat as sinister, fit company for witches, a denizen 

 of graveyards, companion of ghouls. The Chinese have the 

 good sense— and the felicitation— to judge the creature in its 

 proper light; to them it is a symbol of happiness, and is so 

 pictured on their exquisite silks and embroideries. The fact 

 that these people have recognized the animal's good qualities 

 is an indication of their fine sensitivity and powers of observa- 

 tion. When nature produced the bat she succeeded in creat- 

 ing a very finely tuned mechanism, and accorded it a place 

 which no other animal of creation can fill as well. 



Bats have the distinction of being the only mammals which 

 are endowed with true powers of flight. All the others which 

 make pretense at the art are but clumsy performers, novices 

 on a road which the bats traveled centuries ago. Flying squir- 

 rels, phalangers and similar mammals are but parachutists; they 

 can glide or plane; only the bats can truly fly. Few of the birds 

 can approach them in aerial dexterity; hummingbirds, swifts 

 and petrels are, perhaps, their closest rivals; even these must 

 acknowledge inferiority in control. A bat is capable of revers- 

 ing its direction in its own length or of turning a complete 

 right angle within a few inches while in full speed, feats at- 

 tained by it alone. 



Also, the bat is the only animal in the world which flies 

 with its fingers, although a few hundred million years ago the 

 reptiles went it one better when they produced the Pterodactyls 

 which flew with the Httle finger alone! Some of these Ptero- 

 dactyls attained a wing spread of twenty-five feet; the bats 

 reached a maximum of five— but are still in existence while the 



