Vamjylrcs do suck BluoiJ. 303 



America. He never met with them beyond the £7th degree of 

 south latitude, and he observed that the number, both of indivi- 

 duals and species, is greater in the plains than in the mountains, 

 and that it diminishes with the temperature. 



Among the carnivorous animals, M. d'Orbigny particularly 

 studied the bats, especially those named vampires ; and his ob- 

 servations confirm the habit ascribed to them of sucking the 

 blood of animals, and even of man, as was experienced both in 

 relation to the people and mules belonging to his caravan. 

 Such is the avidity of these creatures for blood, that the natives 

 are obliged to pass the night protected by nets, in order to avoid 

 them, and carefully to shut up their fowls and other domestic 

 animals. The vampire generally fixes on the nape of the neck 

 or back of its victim, that the latter may have greater difficulty 

 in getting free, which, however, it sometimes accomplishes by 

 rolling on its back. 



Having often met with the mephitis or skunk, a small carni- 

 vorous animal allied to our polecats, he has not only been able 

 to rectify what is exaggerated in the number of admitted species, 

 but has discovered another very distinct, peculiar to the south- 

 ern parts of America. He has also examined with care the sub- 

 stance which has procured for them the name of mephitis, and 

 which is sufficiently strong and infectious to be felt at two 

 leagues distance at sea, and which compels even the jaguar him- 

 self to abandon his prey, when a mephitis happens to approach. 

 The substance which diffuses this odour is not, as has been so 

 long supposed, the urine of the animal, but a liquid matter of a 

 yellowish-white colour, secreted by the anal glands, as in many 

 other carnivorous animals. He has also rectified what has so 

 long been said about the slowness and sluggish habits of the 

 animal; and has assured himself that the habit attributed to it 

 of letting itself fall from a tree, when wishing to descend, is not 

 practised by it, but is rather to be ascribed to the coati. He 

 has, in like manner, observed the manners of the JcinJcaJou, a 

 nocturnal and frugivorous animal. 



M. d'Orbigny's mammalogical collections contain, besides, a 

 fine example of the red wolf, first brought into this country by 

 Humboldt : also an animal which frequents extensive plains, 



X 2 



