Little Brown-bat 1157 



when three or four inches away. When it wanted to rest it 

 settled on one of the weights of a gas chandeher in quite an 

 orthodox manner, and when a hand was stretched out to capt- 

 ure it, it flew off again before it was touched. This experi- 

 ment is interesting, especially when we hear that the animal's 

 sight was in no way injured when the wax was removed; it 

 shows that the power of ascertaining the presence of an object 

 does not depend entirely upon sight, and that the difference of 

 air pressure was perceptible by the animal." 



"To account for these phenomena [says Merriam]'* the 

 wings of Bats have been examined for peculiar nerve endings, 

 by Cuvier, Leydig, and Krause, but without any success. The 

 alithor's discoveries are therefore quite new to science. The 

 following is a short abstract of his [Dr. Schobl's] results. 

 The Bat's wing-membrane consist of 2 sheets of skin, the upper 

 derived from that of the back, the lower from that of the belly. 

 The epidermic and Malpighian layers in each sheet remain 

 separate, while the true skin is inseparably fused. In this fused 

 medium layer are imbedded the muscles, nerves, vessels, etc., 

 of the wing. * * * The whole wing is covered, both on the 

 upper and under surface, with extremely fine, sparsely scattered 

 hairs. * * * Each hair-sac has from 2 to 7 sebaceous glands, 

 according to the species, and one sweat gland opening into its 

 sac. The 2 outer fibrous layers of the hair-sac have no sharp 

 line of demarcation to separate them from the surrounding 

 connective tissue, but the inner, or hyaline coat, is highly de- 

 veloped, and, after being constricted beneath the hair bulb, 

 widens out and encloses the sense-bodies (Tastkorperchen),one sense- 

 of which organs is connected with each hair. 



"The nerves of the wings may be considered to consist of 

 5 layers, /. e., there is one occupying the centre of a transverse 

 section of the wing, which gives off on each side of it 4 others, 

 and these are successively finer and finer as they approach the 

 opposite surfaces. The inner layer and the one immediately 

 on each side of it consist of nerve fibres with dark borders, the 

 other layers of pale fibres only. The tastkbrperchen are con- 



" Mam. Adir., 1884, pp. 185-7. 



