100 IN THE ACADIAN LAND. 



and prove very destructive to plantations. 

 There are about four hundred species known to 

 science. They are to be found in all climates, 

 even where it is much colder than in Nova 

 Scotia. During the cold season, of fully six 

 months, they congregate in caves, hanging to 

 the roof in great bunches, where they have been 

 found in midwinter white with frost but un- 

 frozen and alive. With us they pass the winter 

 in old buildings where they can hide under the 

 finish, also in hollow trees, and holes among 

 rocks, etc. It is truly wonderful that they are 

 not frozen in such localities, where the tem- 

 perature must be often many degrees below 

 freezing. Old Nature knows the way, and 

 these curious animals, slung in their wings, 

 sleep on during half a year, without fuel or 

 nourishment, and awake to renew the perils and 

 pleasures of an existence that would hardly 

 seem worth the having. 



It will be worth the study to examine the 

 wing structure of a bat. The wings of a bird 

 are constructed on the two fore limbs. They 

 are arms and wrists and fingers with quills and 

 feathers on them. Until the wrist is reached 

 the bones are very much like our own, the 

 fingers are soldered together, and on them are 

 supported the long quills. From the wrist to 



