SPECIES OF PTEROPINE BAT. 33 
has stated, to the males alone, it can, indeed, scarcely be doubted that he has justly 
determined its use. A secondary use might perhaps be assigned to it by the supposi- 
tion that the secretion poured forth from it might serve to sheathe and protect a pro- 
jecting part of the animal from the friction to which it must be subjected during its 
passage through the air; and it is possible that some advantage may, in this way, be 
derived from it: it is worthy of remark too, as bearing in some degree on the subject, 
that in all the analogous cases just adverted to the secreting organ is placed in front of 
the body, and generally in situations especially exposed to the impulses of the air. A 
suggestion that has been made with reference to my species alone, may be mentioned 
merely to guard others against incautiously advancing the same proposition ; that the 
bright white tuft might serve to attract night-flying insects within reach of the Bat’s 
jaws : it was forgotten, at the moment, that the Pteropi feed on fruits. 
Another suggestion that has occurred as to the use of the largely developed shoulder- 
tuft in the species under consideration connects itself with a curious point of structure 
which the animal appears to exhibit. The wings, in the specimen as preserved, are 
placed so far backwards as to be apparently behind the centre of gravity; and on this 
account it seems possible that the projecting tufts of hairs, looking almost like little 
wings, may aid in giving buoyancy to the animal and in sustaining the ill-poised weight 
of its head and neck. But as there is evident distortion in the mode in which the skin 
is preserved, it is impossible to determine to what undue extent the wings may have 
been kept backwards and the neck have been elongated ; and until these points can be 
ascertained, by the examination of specimens preserved in spirit, no deductions can 
safely be founded upon them. If the present condition of the specimen should prove 
to be even a near approximation to the correct form of the animal, the backward 
position of its flying membranes would justify its separation as the type of a distinct 
genus, for which the name of Epomophorus might be used. It is possible that the 
Pter. macrocephalus of Mr. Ogilby might be generically associated with it, asin that 
animal also the alar membranes appear to be affixed to the body at a more backward 
point than usual; although by no means so remotely as in my species. 
The Pter. macrocephalus of Mr. Ogilby has other relations with the Bat which I am 
now describing. Besides the apparently backward position of the wings, and in addi- 
tion to the fact, already adverted to, of its inhabiting the same country, it has also the 
same system of dentition, with a single trifling and anomalous exception. The same 
system of dentition is also exhibited by another Bat from the same country, the Pter. 
Gambianus, Og. When describing the two species referred to, Mr. Ogilby remarked 
that they ‘‘ present some modifications of dentition which have not yet been observed 
in other species, and which appear to indicate a subgenus, probably representing the 
common Asiatic forms on this [the western] coast of Africa. These animals have the 
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