Page:Natural History (1848).djvu/53

Rh of the smallest as well as most common of our English Bats, will illustrate the genus. The length of its head and body is about an inch and a half, and that of the tail less than an inch and a quarter more; while the expanse of the wings in flight does not much exceed eight inches. It is of a reddish-brown hue, the under parts being paler than the upper.

This little bat resorts to the eaves and crevices of buildings for concealment by day, and during its winter torpidity. It is more easily roused than our other species, and is active at a lower temperature; hence it is occasionally seen abroad on fine days very late in the season, pursuing the gnats and tipuladæ which often dance in the winter’s sun. We have repeatedly seen bats, doubtless of this species, coursing through the most thronged streets of the metropolis, on an afternoon in November; and Mr. Bell mentions a specimen which was shot just before Christmas. As early as the middle of March it is again active, and commences its long summer-campaign against the humming swarms of the evening air. To us there has always seemed something particularly pleasing in the flight of the little harmless Bats. We naturally associate with them the soothing quietude of evening, the warm sunset with its gilded clouds fading into night, the placid face of the moon, the brawling of the pebbly brook, the darkening surface of the pool, the solemn eushes of the nightingale’s song, the spark of the glowworm in the herbage, and the thousand mingled perfumes that come from the hedgerow and the field. Then comes the little Bat flitting around us on silent