The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1910-01-04
BLOODSUCKING BATS
These Pests Are Plentiful In the
 Forests ot Brazil.
THEY ARE TRUE VAMPIRES.

.-t Cattle and Horses Are Their Chiei
 Victims. Which They Prefer to Hu-
 man Reings-Their ChiseI like Teeth
 and Peculiar Interior Anatomy.
 Half dozen of us tad been telling what we thought we Knew about DluOdsmkins bats. but our conversa- ton had deveioped only an astonlsh- lug anfouut ot fnlSinformatiou and ir- ses'ouciiabie differences So we called in the dUrtor who had lived some FearS. in Brazil and asked him to comb put our tangled Ideas.
 .-l'm not surprised at your confu- sion." he began. .-for at one time or another l have believed above every thing your questions would suggest. When ! was scno0lboy the vampire Eas a baf as large aS crow. had a horn op his uose aud was described as sitting on bis victims feet. fauning him with his wings while he worked ais pumping apparatus. There is such ! bat. bur when 1t was proved that it was a fruit eater u,any of us doubted the whole bat legend along with the ,ld mythology. There is a bioodslnking vampire. however-millions of them.
 '.The old Spanish conquIstadors found proof ot its existence m sure great toes. which looked as if the skin bud been deIicately sbaved off. just ieep enough to ooze Diurtd. but they never caught one and naturally laid the blame to the biggest ones they found. whirb are nearly all vegetari. ti.s Tue real thing is snaii reddish brown creature closely resembling bats ,f the same color caught here not in- frequently.
 ''rhe naturalist finds. however. some surprising differences. They have no teeth for any purpose save for thin- nIug the skin not enough for the 6lt,sd to flow freely. but just sufficient 70 enable then, fo draw II by suction The wound rarely bieeds after they leave It. This prrparaiinn is done wuh | pair of chiSeiiike teeth. sharp as knife. Their interior anatomy differs from other animais as welt as their teeth All the other aniiiiais. so far as kuow. have q stomach and uecessary Drgans for sonserfing food into bltiod. The trne vaInpire has ouly an eiun gated sarklike intestine for be storage sf the bls,od taken. which requires no aigextion till it is taken up intO the .irruiatory system. With neither teeth nor stomach. it has no alternative. 1t must find fss,trishnient ready made.
 .~fhis peruliarity may or may not ncrHint for one very strange thing nh <Sf rf<. and h0rses are the chief ones. Not 3ne human being in hundred entire g satisfies their taste. Not half the people who live among them all their nvee are ever bitten. Hut If one of famiIy. for instsnce. just suits them they'll follow thai person to any part ,f the house. and no matter how care fully he may be covered or screened they will and their particular tipple.
 .sThe stories of their biepding people almost to death are true oniy partly. have known 0f one boy who was so persisfentiy folluwpd that. while the loss of blood was small from q single Rftas,k. after months of the drain he was greatly reduced fin vitality. He was always bitten in the sa me place the end of the great toe--and tt be same so iarerated that there was con siderable subsequent hemorrhage. This lad was the youngest of four broth CTS. They all slept In the same room md sometimes changed beds. but none of the others was ever bitten.
 s'Cattie and horses are attacked al- ways at spot on the spine just back pf the shoulders. where the hair sep lrates in a xtariike spot. This in the sase of horse is just where the front end of ihe saddle cuines. and the at- tack therefore makes vast deai of trouble where every one rides horse back. A majority of the Brazilian horxes and nearly all the cows are bit ten by these plagles.
 'Fortuuately the pests are mostly eonHned to he forest country. They give comparatively little trouble in cit- les aud vilages. though the construc- tion of houses makes 1t Impossible to keep them out. iB cities tiles are ex eiusiveiy used for roofs and in the country palm leaf thateh hing. and ali kinds of bats come and gu at pleasure. One rarely gpes to sleep without from pne to q dozen flying about the rootn. They are nearly all harmless and are Epicump because t.iey catch insects. They all look so much alike that one does not know which to attack.
 How the genuine vaniIpIres eluded scientific resesrch so long is nys- tefy. The spes'ies was not positively Identified until the visit of Darwin In inc Beagle 1t WAS in the seventies. think. and there Is not at the present day. so far as I can learn. a single well authenticated case recorded in the natural histories of true vam pire being captured while feeding ori I human being."- Dewey Austin Cobt tn New York Tribune.