NA TURE 



585 



THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3, 1878 



DOBSOISPS CATALOGUE OF BATS 

 Catalogue of the Chiroptera in the Collection of the 

 British Museum. By George Edward Dobson, M.A., 

 M.B. London. (Printed by Order of the Trustees. 

 I vol., 8vo. 1878.) 



THOUGH Mr. Dobson' s work is modestly termed a 

 " Catalogue," it amounts, in fact, to a complete mono- 

 graphic essay on what has hitherto been justly regarded as 

 the most difficult and the least understood, as it is the most 

 numerous, of all the orders of mammals. Not only are the 

 families and genera of the Chiroptera well characterised 

 in this volume, and all the known species described in 

 concise though sufficiently explicit terms, but synopses of 

 the members of each genus are added in order to facili- 

 tate their determination, and excellent notes on the com- 

 parative anatomy, habits, distribution, and position of 

 these animals are given, whenever 'such information is 

 available. Mr. Dobson, it is true, has had unusual 

 opportunities in dealing with this subject, but it is not the 

 less to his credit that he has taken such good advantage 

 of them. Having commenced his studies upon the 

 bats during his official residence in India, he has been 

 able to make himself personally acquainted with the forms 

 inhabiting that country, and likewise to examine the 

 types of Blyth's descriptions in the Indian Museum at 

 Calcutta, without sight of which it would have been im- 

 possible to recognise what was intended by them. In 

 this country the late Dr. Gray turned his attention at 

 various times to the Chiroptera, and besides describing 

 numerous species even more hastily and imperfectly than 

 Mr. Blyth, indulged himself in the evil practice of altering 

 some of the types upon which he had found his genera and 

 species. Having the national collection at his command, 

 Mr. Dobson has been able to redu^ce all these eccentrici- 

 ties into order. On the continent the accomplished 

 zoologist of Berlin, Dr. W. Peters, is almost the only 

 naturalist who has of late years worked at this perplexing 

 group, of mammals. Dr.^^ Peters has published many 

 excellent memoirs on various genera of bats in the 

 Monatsberichte and Denkschriften of the Berlin Academy, 

 in the course of which he has given us an account of his 

 examination of numerous obscure types of the older 

 author. Mr. Dobson has worked up the results of these 

 memoirs into his monograph, and has at the same time 

 had the advantage of examining in the Museum of Berlin 

 the materials upon which Dr. Peters has based many of 

 his conclusions. Mr. Dobson has also visited the great 

 museums of Leyden and Paris, and has studied the 

 specimens described by Temminck, Geoffroy St. Hilaire, 

 and A. Milne-Edwards, belonging to these collections. 

 In fact he has had under his eyes nearly all the available 

 materials for a study of the group, unless it be the speci- 

 mens collected by Natterer in the Imperial Zoological 

 Cabinet at Vienna, and a few types lately described by 

 Mr. Allen in America. Under these circumstances Mr. 

 Dobson' s so-called "Catalogue " has, as we have already 

 remarked, become a monograph of a very high order of 

 merit, and one which reflects the greatest credit upon the 

 talents and the industry of the author. 



Mr. Dobson recognises 400 species of the order 

 Vol. xviii.— No. 466 



I Chiroptera, which he divides primarily into " Mega- 

 ! chiroptera" and " Micro-chiroptera." We do not quite 

 see the advantage of these newly-coined names over the 

 more usually employed terms of " Frugivora " and 

 i " Insectivora," even if they had been classically com- 

 ; pounded, which, unfortunately, is not quite the case. 

 j Certain it is that the new terms are not more absolutely 

 ! true than the older ones, as some of the smaller "Mega- 

 i chiroptera" are inferior in size to the larger "Micro- 

 I chiroptera." About seventy species of the Frugivorous 

 bats are allowed full rank in the present work, the author, 

 who holds very sound views on the true limits of species,, 

 having reduced to the grade of sub-species some of the 

 forms recognised by previous writers. The more nume- 

 rous " Micro-chiroptera " constitute five families, namely 

 the Rhinolophidae, Nycteridae, Vespertilionidae, Embal- 

 lonuridse,. and Phyllostomidfe, according to Mr. Dobson. 

 This arrangement is not very (fifferent from that of Dr. 

 Peters in 1865. Dr. Peters' " Megadermata " do not 

 quite correspond to Mr. Dobson' s "Nycteridae," and Mr. 

 Dobson puts the "Brachjnira" and "Molossi" of Dr. 

 Peters together in his family " Emballonuridse." There 

 are other minor differences, but it is satisfactory to see 

 that these two great authorities on an obscure group of 

 mammals are so nearly agreed as to their^ general 

 arrangement. 



Mr. Dobson has not made any suggestion as to the 

 special use of the extraordinary adhesive discs which are 

 attached to the inferior surface of the thumbs of Thyrop- 

 tera tricolor, except by designating them as "highly 

 specialised cHmbing organs." This they certainly are, 

 but to climb what are they highly specialised ? We have 

 been told by one who has observed them in their native 

 haunts that these abnormal bats are always found 

 adhering to the smooth stems of certain palm-trees 

 on the upper Amazons, and it is for this purpose, 

 no doubt, that these peculiar suckers are provided. 

 As regards the vexed question of the true blood- 

 sucking bats, Mr. Dobson seems to adhere to the now 

 generally-received opinion that the only ce^tainly-kno^vn 

 sanguivorous species are the two Desmodontes {Des- 

 modus rufus and Diphylla ecandata), in which the alimen- 

 tary canal is specially modified in relation to their peculiar 

 diet. Vampyrus spectrum, formerly considered so for- 

 midable a blood-sucker, is probably purely frugivorous, 

 and older writers have made similar accusations against 

 certain species of Glossophaga and Artibeus. But Des- 

 modus is the only culprit that has been actually " caught 

 in the act," and naturalists are always somewhat in- 

 credulous in cases of merely circumstantial evidence. 

 As regards the peculiar structure of the stomach of the 

 Desmodontes it is not quitetrue, as stated by Mr. Dobson, 

 that no other zoologists but Prof. Huxley and Dr. Peters 

 " seem to have been aware of this remarkable departure 

 from the simple type of that organ found in aU other 

 Micro-chiroptera." As Herr v. Petzeln. has lately told 

 us,^ this peculiarity did not escape the vigilant eyes of 

 the late Johann Natterer, who recorded it in his note- 

 book in 1824, although his remarks were never published, 

 and, if we are not mistaken. Prof. Reinhardt has also 

 noticed it. 



Mr. Dobson' s letter-press is illustrated by thirty litho- 



» S:tz. k.k. zoolog.-botan. Ges. in Wien, vol. xxviii. 



AA 



