BATS 



side, safe under her wing, it is snug and warm 

 while its coat comes and it grows and develops. 

 As young bats are generally bom in the middle 

 of the summer, they are full grown and able 

 to look after themselves before the time comes 

 for the winter sleep. 



Some bats separate for the winter, like the 

 long-eared bats I have mentioned, but others 

 congregate in large numbers. This is especially 

 the case with those kinds that like caves, such 

 as the horse-shoe bats, of which more by and by. 

 There are some caves which have been used by 

 bats for countless years, and their droppings 

 have accumulated until they are a thick mass 

 on the floor. If you look at a heap such as 

 this, you will be able to form an idea of what 

 bats feed upon, for it is made up of the un- 

 digested hard parts of insects, chewed wings, 

 wing cases of small beetles, insects' legs, all 

 broken up and difiicult to distinguish, but un- 

 mistakably belonging to insects. It is the 

 search for good roosting-places that sometimes 

 makes bats come into the house. 



The long-eared bat is the one which so often 

 gets into the rooms in an evening, for when 

 hunting round the house for insects it is apt 

 to dart in at any open window, only to cause 



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