NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 97 
or two to procure the other likewise, I was somewhat disappointed, 
when it appeared to be also of the same sex. This circumstance, 
and the great scarcity of this sort, at least in these parts, occasions 
some suspicions in my mind whether it is really a species, or whether 
it may not be the male part of the more known species, one of 
which may supply many females ; as is known to be the case in 
sheep and some other quadrupeds. But this doubt can only be 
GREAT BAT. 
cleared by a farther examination, and some attention to the sex, of 
more specimens; all that I know at present is, that my two were 
amply furnished with the parts of generation, much resembling 
those of a boar.* 
In the extent of their wings they measured fourteen inches and 
* See Letters XXII., XXVI. The British fauna is indebted to White for the first notice 
of this species; it is locally distributed, and although not common generally is found in 
numbers together, so many as 185 having been taken in one night from the eaves of 
Queen’s College, Cambridge. It was first described by Daubenton, under the name ot 
La noctule, which name Latinised was afterwards continued, and is prior to White’s 
name of a/tivolans, which we regret has not been retained, as it is so characteristic or 
the habits of the species. ie 
