CHIROPTERA— VESPERTILIONID^E— A. NOVEBORACENSIS. 80 



a series of about twenty Massachusetts skins, all the males are of a beauti- 

 ful bright yellowish-red, with scarcely a trace of the apical white ; the 

 females, though somewhat more variable, are darker, the light red of the 

 males being replaced in these by dark russet, which is more or less obscured 

 by the whitish tips." The same author continues respecting other points : 



"Very little appears to be known respecting the time of copulation or 

 period of gestation of the bats. From Mr. J. Gr. Shute, of Woburn, Mass., 

 T learn a fact in reference to this point. Soon after sunset one evening in 

 October, he observed a strange object pass him in the air, which seemed to 

 fall to the ground not far from where he was standing. Repairing immedi- 

 ately to the spot, he soon found it, which proved to be a pair of these bats 

 in coitu. They were captured and thrown into alcohol, and thus forwarded 

 to the Museum of Comparative Zoology." Aerial venery is doubtless prac- 

 ticed by other species, as it is by some birds, like the well-known Chimney 

 Swift for instance. 



In most portions of the United States, the Red Bat is one of the most 

 abundant, characteristic, and familiar species, being rivaled in these respects 

 by the Little Brown Bat alone. It would be safe to say that, in any given 

 instance of a bat entering our rooms in the evening, the chances are a 

 hundred to one of its being either one or the other of these two species. 

 The perfect noiselessness and swiftness of its flight, the extraordinary agility 

 with which it evades obstacles — even the most dexterous strokes designed 

 for its capture — and the unwonted shape, associated in popular superstition 

 with the demons of the shades, conspire to revulsive feelings that need 

 little fancy to render weird and uncanny. But the bat is no ghost ; on the 

 contrary, a substantial, compact little creature of flesh and blood, much like 

 a mouse with wings, completely animal to the tips of its ears and tail ; an 

 erratic yet busy little hunter for insects, out on the fly after bugs, attracted 

 to our apartments not by the light as some suppose, but simply in pursuit 

 of its prey, which is attracted by the light. When captured, which may 

 not be until far on in a breathless attack with brooms, tongs, and hats, 

 during which the furniture is upset and the lamp perhaps put out, the 

 little animal will be found a reddish, furry, flat creature, with membranes 

 of excpiisite delicacy, folded on each side like half of a tiny umbrella, of 



