NATURAL HISTORY . 
290 
THE AFRICAN MEGADERM.* 
The best known African species ( Megaderma from) is an inhabitant of the west coast of that 
continent, where it is found in Senegal and Guinea. In this Bat the ears and nasal appendage (see 
p. 289) attain even a greater development than in Megaderma lyra ; the earlet is very long, especially 
the posterior division of it ; the ears are united by their inner margin for about half their length ; and 
the fur is of an ashy colour, with a faint yellowish tinge. A second African Megaderma has been 
recently described by Professor Peters under the name of M. cor; it is from Egypt, and somewhat 
THE AFRICAN MEGADERM. (OllC-tllU'd Natural Size.) 
resembles M. spasma in the form of its nose-leaf, but in other respects is more nearly related to 
M. from. 
TILE DESERT BAT.f 
At the first glance, the Desert Bat would seem to have but little to do with the Megaderms, but 
its general organisation is very similar. The nose-leaf — the striking charac- 
teristic of the head in the Megaderms — is entirely wanting, unless indeed 
we may, with Professor Gervais, regard the groove which runs up the face 
from the nose to the forehead as really representing a sunken nose-leaf. 
This groove, or furrow, is a deep depression, increasing both in width 
and depth as it runs backwards, and is of such extent as to leave traces of 
its existence even on the underlying bones. In its posterior part the floor 
of the depression is divided lengthwise by a narrow ridge, and its sides 
are margined, as far back as the eyes, with peculiar horizontal cutaneous 
appendages. It is thus, evidently, a somewhat different manifestation of 
the tendency towards a peculiar development of the cutaneous system in 
head of the desert bat. the neighbourhood of the nose which we have seen to be characteristic 
of the Rhinolophidse and Megaderms, and no doubt subserves the 
same purpose in the economy of the animal as the external nasal appendages of those Bats. 
The ears are large, and united across the forehead by a sort of membranous band ; the tail 16 
* Megaderma from. f Nycteris thcbaica. 
