28 BATS. 



in Richmond Park. Great numbers of bats repose in the natural 

 caves in mountains and rocks, a situation in which Homer 

 notices them: 



" As in the cavern of some rifted den, 



Where flock nocturnal bats and birds obscene ; 

 Cluster'd they hang, till, at some sudden shock, 

 They move, and murmurs run through all the rock" 



In Egypt they not only inhabit caves, but also the subter- 

 ranean excavations which were made by the ancient Egyptians. 

 Mr. Davison, when descending a well in one of the largest 

 pyramids at Djizeh, in Egypt, disturbed a multitude of bats; 

 and when exploring a passage in the same pyramid, he was 

 obliged to retire, owing to its being, in a great measure, choked 

 up with bats' dung, which in some places was nearly a foot 

 deep j and when Mr. Caviglia, some years afterwards, pursued 

 the same path, their dung had increased to the depth of a foot 

 and a half. 



Though the night is the proper or usual time for the bat's 

 flight, yet it has been seen more than once flying in the day- 

 time. Gilbert White records his having seen a bat flying after 

 insects, during sunshine, on the 27th of July 5 and expresses 

 a suspicion that it was a female, which was, perhaps, hungry 

 from feeding her young. He also notices that the swallows 

 struck at it, which, I may add, is not surprizing, for they 

 strike at owls also, and probably from the same reason. Mr. 

 Gould shot a common bat in the middle of a bright, sunny, but 

 frosty day, just before Christmas -, and Dr. T. B. Salter says, 

 that on March 6, 1838, during a bright sunshine, at one o'clock, 

 he observed one flying about in search of food in a garden at 

 Poole, in Dorsetshire. 



What the swallow is among birds the bat is among mammals ; 

 and while the day is the period for the former to chace the 

 insects, the night-time is the period for the bat to pursue them ; 

 and should he reverse this arrangement by daring to encroach 

 upon her airy way, she is perfectly justified in striking at him, 

 to teach him to know his proper time and season. When the 

 swallow has ceased her elegant flight after the insects that sport 



