EXPEDITION TO SURINAM. 



quently not painful; yet through this orifice he conti- 

 nues to fuck the blood, until he is obliged to difgorge. He 

 then begins again, and thus continues fucking and dif- 

 gorging till be is fcarcely able to fly, and the fufferer has 

 often been known to fleep from time into eternity. Cat- 

 tle they generally bite in the ear, but always in fuch 

 places where the blood flows fpontaneoufly, perhaps in 

 an artery — but this is entering rather on the province of 

 the medical faculty. Having applied tobacco-aflies as 

 the befl remedy, and wafhed the gore from myfelf and 

 from my hammock, I obferved feveral fmall heaps of 

 congealed blood all round the place where I had lain, 

 upon the ground : upon examining which, the furgeon 

 judged that I had loll at leaft twelve or fourteen ounces 

 during the night. 



As I have fince had an opportunity of killing one of 

 thefe bats, I cut off his head, which I here prefect to the 

 reader in its natural flze, and as a great curiofity, with 

 the whole figure flying above it on a fmaller fcale. Hav- 

 ing meafured this creature, I found it to be between the 

 tips of the wings thirty-two inches and a half; it is faid 

 that fome are above three feet, though nothing like in 

 fize to the bats of Madagafcar. The colour was a dark 

 brown, nearly black, but lighter under the belly. Its 

 afpe6l was truly hideous upon the whole, but particularly 

 the head, which has an ere^t fhining membrane above 

 the nofe, terminating in a fhrivelled point : the ears are 

 long, rounded, and tranfparent : the cutting teeth were 

 four above and fix below. I faw no tail, but a fkin, in 

 * the 



