428 BATS. 



Cheiropterous dentition attain, is manifested in the great frugivorous 

 Bats, which have been sometimes, but erroneously, called Vam- 

 pires ; but which have never been met with in South America, 

 the peculiar country of the true blood-sucking Bats. 



The frugivorous species, sometimes called " flying-foxes" and by 

 the French " Rousettes," include the largest animals of the order Chei- 

 roptera, and constitute the genus Pteropus ; their dental formula is : 



in. '^^', c. J^; pm. 3-=^; m '^: = 34. (PL 112. fig. 10.) 



The upper incisors are small, equal, contiguous, ranged in a 

 semi-circle, with broad, sub-incisive crowns ; the inferior ones are 

 obtuse, the middle pair very small in some species ; the number, 

 shape, and disposition of the incisors manifest an approximation 

 to the Quadrumanous type of dentition. (1) The upper canines are 

 long, rather slender and sharp-pointed, but are sub-tetragonal, the 

 four facets being separated by strong longitudinal ridges ; a transverse 

 ridge divides the inner side of the base of the crown from the fang ; 

 the lower canines are smaller, with an anterior and posterior lon- 

 gitudinal ridge, and an internal transverse basal ridge. A wide 

 space separates the upper incisors from the canines ; they almost 

 touch below. The first premolar above is extremely minute, and 

 sometimes wanting, as in Pteropus Whitei and the species figured (fig. 

 10) ; in some species it is situated in the middle of the diastema 

 between the canine and second premolar, in other species it is close 

 to the canine. In the lower jaw the first premolar is larger and more 



subsist ; it extends in almost a straight line from the stomach to the vent. ITie dentition of the 

 so called " Vampire," minutely described by M. de Blainville m his " Osteographie des Cheirop- 

 teres," p. 32, is that of an insectivorous species of P/iyllostoma, in which the intestine is twice 

 the length of the body. 



The complex stomach of a Pteropus is described as that of a Vampyre Bat in the 

 " Lectures of Comparative Anatomy," by Sir Everard Home, who thereupon infers that 

 "the Vampyre-bat lives on the sweetest of vegetables; and all the stories related with so 

 much confidence of its living on blood, and coming in the night to destroy people while 

 asleep, are entirely fabulous," p. I60. The blood-thirsty habits of the true Vampires have 

 been observed by more than one scientific traveller in South America. Dr. Spix calls one of these 

 bats, which he discovered in Brazil, *' Sanguisuga crudelissima" ; and Mr. Darwin has recorded 

 the attack of another species which fastened upon the withers of his horse, during a nocturnal 

 bivouac in ChUe. See " Voyages of the Adventure and Beagle," vol. iii, p. 25. 



(1) In some species of Roussette, as the Pteropus Peronii, only a single pair of incisors 

 has been observed in both upper and lower jaws. See M. de Blainville loc. cit, p. 3S. 



