184 COMMON BRITISH ANIMALS 



a pipe-like gullet suitable only for swallowing liquid 

 food and no true stomach. 



There is also a blood-sucking bat in India known 

 as the Indian vampire {Megaderma lyra), but his 

 principal victims are frogs. 



In strange contrast with the usual sombre colour- 

 ing of bats there is a genus of bats in Ceylon 

 which are highly coloured. These coloured bats 

 belong to the family Yespertilionidae, and are 

 therefore distant cousins of some of our British 

 bats. Of these Kerivoula picta is the best known, 

 and so gay is its colouring that it has been likened 

 to a huge butterfly. 



