210 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
very similar coloration, the fur of the body being of some shade of orange- 
brown, whilst the wings are variegated with orange and black. The grounds 
for regarding this coloration as an instance of protective mimicry may be 
seen from the following quotation from a paper by Mr. Swinhoe. He says : 
— u A species of Kerivoula allied to K.picta and K. formosa , was brought to 
me by a native. The body of this bat was of an orange-brown ; but the 
wings were painted with orange-yellow and black. It was caught, sus- 
pended head downwards, on a cluster of the round fruit of the Longan-tree 
(Nephelium longanum). Now this tree is an evergreen; and all the year 
through some portion of its foliage is undergoing decay, the particular leaves 
being, in such a stage, partially orange and black. This bat can, therefore, 
at all seasons, suspend from its branches, and elude its enemies by its resem- 
blance to the leaf of the tree. It was in x^ugust when this specimen was 
brought to me. It had at that season found the fruit ripe and reddish- 
yellow, and had tried to escape observation in the semblance of its own tints 
to those of the fruit.” With regard to the great Frugivorous bats of the 
genus Pteropus, which measure nearly a foot long, with an expanse of wing 
between four and five feet, Dr. Dobson says : — a Anyone who has seen a 
colony of these bats suspended from the branches of a banyan-tree, or from a 
silk cotton-tree ( Eriodendron orient ale), must have been struck with their 
resemblance to large ripe fruits, and this is especially noticeable when they 
hang in clusters from the leaf-stalks of the cocoa-nut palm, where they may 
be easily mistaken for a bunch of ripe cocoa-nuts. Hanging close together, 
each with his head bent forwards on the chest, his body wrapped up in the 
ample folds of the large wings, and the back turned outwards, the brightly 
coloured head and neck is presented to view, and resembles the extremity 
of a ripe cocoa-nut, with which this animal also closely corresponds in size.” 
Of the smaller Frugivorous bats of the genera Cynoptei'us and Maeroghssus, 
which feed on the fruit of guavas, plantains and mangoes, Dr. Dobson 
remarks that they “ resemble these fruits closely in the yellow colour of 
their fur and in their size, so that it is very difficult to detect one of these 
bats when suspended among the leaves of any of these trees,” but he is not 
prepared to maintain that these are examples of “ protective mimicry.” 
The Nest of the Aye-Aye . — According to MM. A. Milne-Edwards and 
Grandidier, that curious quadrumanous mammal the Aye-Aye ( Chiromys 
madagascariensis ) constructs a large globular nest. A specimen procured 
by M. Soumagne, honorary French consul in Madagascar*, and sent by him to 
Paris, is described as being made with much care and art at the fork of 
several branches of a large Dicotyledonous tree. Its outer surface is 
formed of large rolled-up leaves of the Ravinala ( or travellers’ tree), serving 
as an impermeable covering for the interior, which contains an accumulation 
of small twigs and leaves. The narrow aperture is placed on one side. In 
this respect, as MM. Milne-Edwards and Grandidier remark, the Aye-Aye 
resembles the lower members of the order Lemurina (such as l.epilemur y 
Chirogaleus, and especially Microcebus ), which bring up their young either 
in holes of trees or in true nests. The nest of Microcebus myoxinus is de- 
scribed as resembling on a small scale that of a crow, being composed of 
small twigs interlaced, with a depression lined with hairs in the centre, in 
which the young repose. — Comptes rendus, January 22, 1877. 
