years, a Bat was discovered in a torpid state; that he
himself made a very careful search about the vault, and was unable to
discover any crack through which the smallest Bat could have crept; that
the vault was surrounded with brickwork; the entrance was bricked up,
and over the steps was placed a close-fitting slab; and that he could
come to no other conclusion than that the Bat had been inclosed there
for twenty-one years. I confess that I quite agree in opinion with Mr
Bartlett, and believe that the Bat discovered in the vault in
Bishopsbourne church crept in on the occasion of its last opening: and
so in the like manner with the one found in my own church; for although
there is unquestionably a vast difference between twenty-one and a
hundred and six years, yet, if we can establish the fact of a Bat
remaining torpid for the shorter period, I find no difficulty in
understanding that a sleep which would endure so long as that did, might
be protracted to a far longer period. It is most probable that many will
differ from me in opinion, and perhaps some will ridicule the idea: if
they can discover any other probable or even possible means of
accounting for the presence of the Bat in the vault, exclusive of a
crack or chink in it, or of its having been opened within the memory of
living man, both of which views I firmly oppose, I shall feel greatly
obliged by their stating their opinions in the _Zoologist_: meanwhile I
hold to my belief, that the Bat had been there for not less than _one
hundred and six years_!"[112]

[97] Bell's _Brit. Rept._ (1839), 112.

[98] _Zoologist_, 614.

[99] _Zool._, 1879.

[100] _Zool._, 3632.

[101] _Zool._, 3808.

[102] _Zool._, 3848.

[103] _Zool._, 3904.

[104] _Zool._, 5959.

[105] _Zool._, 6537.

[106] _Ibid._, 6565.

[107] Richardson's _Borderer's Table Book_, iii. 92.

[108] _Zool._, 3266.

[109] _Zool._, 6941.

[110] _Zool._, 613.

[111] See page 183, _ante_.

[112] _Zool._, 4245.

V.

HYBERNATION OF SWALLOWS.

What becomes of our swallows in the winter? They migrate, you reply,
to a warmer parallel. That is true, no doubt; though there have not
been wanting naturalists of respectable name who have maintained that
none of them ever leave the country. No doubt, however, they do migrate;
but is this true of the entire body, or only of a portion? That the
whole hirundinal population--swifts, swallows, martins, and
bank-martins--disappear from view,