The wall cases of this gallery, to which the visitor's attention
should now be exclusively devoted, contain various zoological
families. In the first eight wall cases of the room are distributed
the varieties of Bats. These are placed here, away from the mammalia,
on account of the pressure of room. They are not to be mistaken as
birds in any particular. They are essentially mammalia, inasmuch as
they produce their young in a breathing state and suckle them. The
bats of England and other cold climates remain in a torpid condition,
and only spread their wings of stretched skin when the songbirds
report the advent of the warmth of spring. The visitor will notice
amongst the varieties in the three first cases, the Brazilian bats,
including the vampire bat (which has been known to attack a man in his
sleep and suck blood from him), the remarkable leaf-nosed bats which
are ranged upon the upper shelves, and the Indian and African
varieties; and underneath are grouped the well-known horse-shoe bats
of the eastern hemisphere. In the next case (4) are the long-eared
European bats, with ears like curled leaves; and the American,
African, and Australian varieties. The fifth case is filled with
groups of the African and Indian taphozous; the South American
tropical bats; and the West Indian chelonicteres and moormops. The
last three cases, devoted to the varieties of the bat (6-8), contain
those sub-families which are known as Flying Foxes, from their great
size. These live on fruits, and inhabit Australia, and the southern
countries of the eastern hemisphere.
The visitor's way now lies westward into the second compartment of the
northern zoological gallery; for in this room, as in the rooms through
which he has already passed, he should confine his attention, for the
present, to the wall cases, reserving the examination of all table
cases for his return visit, on his way out. And here the visitor may
well pause to think upon the zoological travels he has already made,
from the mammalia, which present the highest types of animal life;
through the sub-families of birds, which form Cuvier's secondary class
of vertebrata, or animals with a back-bone; to the threshold of the
room in which the tertiary class of back-boned animals are deposited.
This class includes the great families of