417 



will give his mind to it. Results of value, however, can only be 

 obtained after many years of close observation, carried on for tlie 

 most part in the same locality. It is the Local Faiiuist to whom I 

 particularly address myself in this paper ; and such surely there 

 ought to be — many we might suppose— in every Local Natural 

 History Society. 



And here I might stop, did I not feel that this paper would be 

 imperfect if it had no bearing on the Fauna of the district, 

 which it belongs to our own Field Club to investigate. Before 

 concluding, therefore, I would say a few words respecting the 

 Zoology of the West of England, stating more especially what has 

 been done towards a knowledge of the animals found about Bath. 

 Having spent all the first part of my life in Cambridgeshire, while 

 for the last twenty years I have been resident in the Bath neigh- 

 bourhood, it has afforded me an opportunity of comparing in a 

 general way the Fauna of the Eastern counties with that of the 

 Western. 



Our knowledge of the actual species of animals met with round 

 Bath rests mainly on the lists furnished by Mr. Charles Terry to 

 "Wright's Historic Guide to Bath."* These lists embrace the 

 Mammals, Birds, Fishes, Reptiles, and Lepidopterous Insects. The 

 mammals amount to 29 ; to which not many additions are likely 

 to be made, except in the bats, of which there are a considerable 

 number of species in Great Britain, and several others are likely to 

 occur in this neighbourhood besides those mentioned by Mr. TeiTy. 

 On some of the species mentioned in his list I will make a few 

 remarks. The Vesjjertilio eraarginatus is a species ill understood ; 

 first described by Geoffroy in France, and it must be considered a 

 very doubtful native of the Bath district, if really found in this 

 island, t 



The common bat of Mr. Terry is probably not the Pipistrelle, of 

 which I have seen only one or two Bath specimens, though 



* Pp. 415-446. 

 t See some remarks by Mr. Tomes on this species of bat, which he does not 

 believe to occur in the British Islands. He is of opinion that the Vespertilio 

 myttacinus has been mistaken for it. Proceed. Zool. Soc, 1858, p. 80. 



