CHAPTER VI 
THE ORDER OF BATS 
CIIIR OPT ERA 
The strange wing-handed, flying mammals 
composing this Order exhibit differences in 
form that are fairly bewildering. They range 
all the way from the beautiful to the fantastic 
and the hideous, and some of them are well 
worthy of study. 
members of the Bat Order as a whole are almost 
as little known as the whales and porpoises of 
the deep sea. Our lack of acquaintance with 
bats is due chiefly to their nocturnal habits, 
and the consequent difficulty in observing them. 
To-day, bats are so little known that there are 
Drawn by J. Carter Beard. 
From a specimen in the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences. 
BORNEAN NAKED BAT. 
The young are carried in two dorsal pouches, from one of which, under the left elbow, a small head protrudes. 
The great majority of bats are useful to man 
in destroying the insects which, without the 
aid of the birds and beasts, very soon would over- 
whelm him. The harmful species are those 
which destroy fruit, and a few which suck the 
blood of domestic animals. 
Owing to certain natural conditions, the 
perhaps a million persons who only know that 
they fly at night, and are “awful things to get 
into your hair.” 
I have seen thousands of bats, flying in many 
different places, but never yet saw one alight 
upon a woman’s hair; and I believe they are no 
more given to doing so than are humming-birds. 
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