362 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 



distributed over the whole of Europe and a great part of Asia, 

 being common in India, China, and Japan, besides various 

 groups of islands, whose avi-fauna has only of late years 

 been investigated. In Egypt, as mentioned by Captain 

 Shelley and Mr J. H. Gurney, jun., it occurs in considerable 

 flocks, and is regarded there as a bird of some worth in the 

 market. In France and Holland great numbers are taken 

 in decoys and sent to this country as table luxuries. Sir 

 William Jardine states, that in the winter of 1842-43, 

 quantities from these countries were sent to the markets of 

 Edinburgh.* 



Major W. Eoss King appears to be the only writer who 

 has thrown out a hint that the American pintail and the 

 European are distinct ; indeed, it would seem, from his state- 

 ment in his " Sportsman in Canada," that the flesh of the one 

 is superior to that of the other.-f- If there should be a 

 difference in the plumage or other specific characters, it would 

 be well to scrutinise carefully all the specimens that are pro- 

 cured from the Outer Hebrides, as these would be the most 

 likely birds to show such differences, assuming, as we may 

 fairly do, that they have come across the Atlantic from the 

 New World. 



XIV. Notes on Epomophorus comptus {Allen.), one of the 

 Large Fruit-Eating Bats; from Old Calahar, West 

 Africa. By John Alexander Smith, Esq., M.D. 



(Specimens of males, female, and young exhibited ; also 

 specimens of Nycteris hispida and Nycteris grandis, 

 Insectivorous Bats from Old Calabar.) 



The Eev. Alexander Eobb, D.D., formerly missionary of 

 the United Presbyterian Church, Old Calabar, and now their 

 Theological Professor at Kingston, Jamaica ; to whom I have 

 been indebted for various interesting specimens of African 

 natural history ; sent me specimens of this bat some consider- 

 able time ago, and I have since been indebted for additional 



* British Birds, part iv., p. 121. 



+ Sportsman and Naturalist in Canada, p. 207. 



