62 MAMMALS

though white and piebald specimens are on record,
and it has its muzzle apparently cut off short, with
a groove on each side leading up to the nostrils.
It is somewhat clumsy looking, and in its flight seems
to take matters much more easily than that commonest
of British bats, the pipistrelle, Vesperugo pzpistrellus,

 

 

 

 

BARBASTELLE BAT WALKING

which is out every evening from March to December,
swift and busy, with long curving swoops and rapid
twists and turns, as if it had not a minute to lose. A
larger bat, and a more powerful one, is the noctule,
belonging to the same genus ; he is the great beetle-
catcher, ‘essentially adapted,’ says Bell, ‘for the cap-