Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/139

Rh Again in Macbeth, Act iv., Scene 1—

The thirty-two known species of Marmosets have, comparatively speaking, a very limited geographical range, being confined to one sub-region (the Brazilian) of Mr. Wallace's Neotropical Region. The following reference to the Marmoset by Shakspeare must, therefore, be taken in the light of a poet's licence: —

It will perhaps be sufficient to class the Bats of Shakspeare in the large and universally distributed family Vespertilionidæ.

Mr. Harting remarks, in his Introduction to the 'Ornithology of Shakspeare' (page 13, foot-note), "In the Midland Counties the Bat is often called 'leathern-wings.' "It is also occasionally called so in Hampshire, but more frequently rear-mouse.

Macbeth, while regretting that Banquo and his son Fleance