. Sketches of the natural history of Ceylon; with narratives and anecdotes illustrative of the habits and instincts of the mammalia, birds, reptiles, fishes, insects, &c. including a monograph of the elephant ... Zoology; Elephants. Chap. I.] BATS. 19 It has been suggested that the insectivorous bats, though nocturnal, are deficient in that keen vision cha- racteristic of animals which take their prey by EHINOLOPHUS. I doubt whether this conjecture be well founded ; it certainly does not apply to the Pteropus and the other frugivorous species, in which the faculty of sight is sin-
. Sketches of the natural history of Ceylon; with narratives and anecdotes illustrative of the habits and instincts of the mammalia, birds, reptiles, fishes, insects, &c. including a monograph of the elephant ... Zoology; Elephants. Chap. I.] BATS. 19 It has been suggested that the insectivorous bats, though nocturnal, are deficient in that keen vision cha- racteristic of animals which take their prey by EHINOLOPHUS. I doubt whether this conjecture be well founded ; it certainly does not apply to the Pteropus and the other frugivorous species, in which the faculty of sight is sin- gularly clear. As regards the others, it is possible that in their peculiar oeconomy some additional power may be required to act in concert with that of vision, as in in- sects, touch is superadded, in its most sensitive develop- ment, to that of sight. It is probable that the nose- leaf, which forms an extended screen stretched behind the nostrils in some of the bats, may be intended by nature to facilitate the collection and conduction of odours, just as the vast expansion of the shell of the ear in the same family is designed to assist in the collection of sounds — and thus to supplement their vision when in pursuit of prey in the dusk by the superior sensi- tiveness of the organs of hearing and smell. One tiny little bat, not much larger than the humble C 2. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Tennent, James Emerson, Sir, 1804-1869. London, Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, booksubjectelephants, booksubjectzoology, bookye
