68 
BAT TRIBE. 
rated ; tlie grinders, or molares, which are gene- 
rally four, both above and below, are of an ab- 
rupt or truncated form, and roughened with coni- 
cal protuberances. The ears are small, round, 
membranaceous, and marked internally by nume- 
rous semicircular transverse streaks, as in a bat„ 
The legs are clothed with a soft yellow down ; 
there are five toes on each foot, united by a com- 
mon membrane, and terminating in large, thin, 
broad, very sharp crooked claws. 
BAT TRIBE. 
These very singular animals would seem at 
sight to hold a kind of middle station between 
the quadrupeds and birds. It is, however, only 
in their power of raising themselves into the air 
by means of the membranes which extend round 
their body, that they are in the least allied to the 
latter, whilst with the other they claim a place, 
from their structure both externally and inter- 
nally. 
Bats have erect sharp-pointed teeth, placed 
near together. Their fore toes are lengthened, 
and connected by the membranes which perform 
the office of wings. 
Their structure cannot be contemplated without 
admiration, the bones of the extremities being 
continued into long and thin processes, connected 
by a most delicately formed membrane or skin, 
capable, from its thinness, of being contracted at 
pleasure into innumerable wrinkles, so as to lie 
