KINDLY permit me to ask for a further explanation from Mr. Geo. J. Romanes about the vampire bat, in regard to which he says in his criticism of “Zoological Sketches” (Oswald): “Mr. Bates says (I presume it is a clerical error giving Mr. Belt as the authority) the vampire, however, is the most harmless of all bats.” Yet he, Mr. Bates, would lead us to believe that a species of the same genus, Phyllostoma, is a blood-sucker, and had even attacked himself (see p. 91 of the fifth edition of his “Naturalist on the Amazon”).