THE VAMPYRE EAT;! C§ 



gm^ill island, one of the Philippines, Dampler tells 

 us that he saw an incredible number of Bats, so 

 large that none of his company could reach from 

 tip to tip of their wings, with their arms extended 

 to the utmost. The wings were of a mouse colour, 

 and on the joints were sharp crooked claws. In the 

 evening, as soon as the sun was set, he says, these 

 animals used to take their flight in swarms, like 

 Bees, to a neighbouring island ; and they were seen 

 to continue in immense numbers, till darkness 

 rendered them no kmger visible. The whole of 

 the time from day-break in the morning till sun- 

 rise, they occupied in returning to their former 

 place ; and this course they constantly pursued 

 all the time the ship remained stationed off thatj 

 island *. 



At Rose Hill, near Port Jackson, in New Hol- 

 land, it is supposed that more than twenly thousand 

 of these animals were seen within the space of a 

 mile \. — Some that were taken alive in New Hol- 

 land, would almost immediately after eat boiled rice> 

 and other food from the hand ; and in a few days 

 became as domestic as if they had been entirely 

 bred in the house. Governor Phillip had a female, 

 which would hang by one leg a whole day without 

 changing its position, and in that pendant situation, 

 with its breast neatly covered with one of its wings, 

 it would eat whatever was oifercd to it, lapping 

 from the hand like a cat J. 



Linnaeus has given to this Bat the specific deno- 

 mination of Vmnpyrus, for his conjecturing it to be 



* DuDipier. \ Hunti-r, 507. % ^^^'^ 



H Ci 



