SHREWS AND BATS 291 



already established themselves, are always on the 

 outlook to make on the newcomers. All through 

 the course of the day, too, and when it might 

 have been supposed that sleep would have led to a 

 cessation of hostilities, sounds of wrangling go on 

 ceaselessly, owing to the restlessness which leads 

 them to be constantly changing their positions and 

 disturbing and irritating their neighbours. When 

 in captivity they are just as prone to quarrel as 

 they are whilst at large. The injuries that they 

 inflict on one another in these scuffles are often 

 very formidable, as the great, soft, leathery surfaces 

 of the wings afford a fine field for the play of their 

 great hooked claws. It is consequently a difficult 

 matter to keep more than one or two of them 

 in the same enclosure in good condition for any 

 length of time, as, even when their encounters do 

 not terminate fatally, their wings are almost sure 

 speedily to present a sadly tattered and unsightly 

 aspect. 



Flying -foxes take to various kinds of trees 

 as the sites for their rookeries, but those that 

 seem to be especial favourites in Upper India are 

 pipals, Ficus religiosa, tamarinds, and high-growing 

 bamboos. The fact that tamarinds are often chosen 

 is probably one reason why they should be regarded 

 as special haunts of bhuts, and why the demon in 

 the Baital Pachisi is described as always hanging 

 itself up in one at the end of each of its conver- 



