Page:Bird Haunts and Nature Memories - Thomas Coward (Warne, 1922).pdf/120

86 When the box was opened in the daytime or early in the evening the bats were comatose, and it took time to awaken them; but later, if left to themselves, they roused and became lively. If neglected during this wakeful period, usually less than an hour, they relapsed into lethargy, and later had to be roused for food; and indeed the normal diurnal sleep of bats seems as profound as the winter slumber which we call hibernation. Alcock found that the breathing became shallow and irregular—"Cheyne-Stokes'," he calls it—and that the temperature rises as much as 31° in fifteen minutes, and it often took that time to induce full activity. I would take a bat in my hand to warm it, and in a few minutes its breathing became rapid, the whole animal panting and shuddering as if in fear; it pumped itself awake. When really roused its whole being changed; its body felt hot, its eyes gleamed, its sensitive ears were in constant motion. Raising itself on the carpal joint it would patter towards me, and if I kept it waiting would climb my arm, snuggle for a few seconds at the back of my neck, and then take wing for its evening exercise. As a rule, however, they were in no hurry for flight, but after a good feed and along drink—for they are thirsty creatures—they liked a short flight round the room. They would lap water from a saucer or suck it from the end of a camel's-hair brush. Raw meat they took if shredded fine, and bits of ﬁsh were also appreciated, but they required teaching before they tackled these unusual viands; what is more, they found them more difficult to masticate than the horny skins of beetles and mealworms.

Mealworms, small moths. bluebottles, and some beetles are tackled and eaten without difficulty, but a dor or a chafer had to be overcome. and large noctuid moths were the most difficult captives. When the bat is walking or at rest the tail is carried in a curve, the tip often under