
THIRD SERIES. 


Von. XIII.] MAY, 1889. [No. 149. 


DAUBENTON’S BAT, VESPERTILIO DAUBENTONII, Leister. 
By tHe Epriror. 
Prate II. 
WE are indebted to Mr. Edward Hart, of Christchurch, for a 
specimen of this Bat, in the flesh, captured in his neighbourhood, 
and from this the illustration, issued inadvertently with our last 
number, was drawn by Mr. Lodge. 
Although usually regarded as one of the rarer British Bats, 
it has probably either escaped particular observation or has been 
perhaps mistaken for some other species. Indeed the various 
captures of specimens referred to in the second edition of Bell’s 
‘British Quadrupeds’ (1874), and the many additional notes of 
its occurrence which we have collected, lead to the conclusion that 
it is entitled to be considered locally common; for where it 
does occur it is by no means solitary, but is found in some 
numbers. This was observed by Mr. Tomes to be particularly 
the case in Warwickshire, where he has seen hundreds flying 
over the Avon at Stratford, and has taken more than twenty at a 
time from the belfry of Stratford Church. Mr. Borrer also found 
great numbers of this Bat in the church at Christchurch, Hants, 
where in one chamber communicating with an aperture in the 
north wall, through which they passed to and from the river, their 
accumulated excrement was “knee-deep.” He had no difficulty 
in procuring as many specimens as he wanted. On several 
evenings afterwards he saw numbers flitting, much in the manner 
‘ ZOOLOGIST.— MAY, 1889, oO 
