Vampire-bat

Vampire-bat, a name given to various kinds of bats, as being supposed to suck blood like the vampire, though few of those so called really indulge this propensity. Thus some of the frugivorous bats called 'flying foxes' (see BAT) of Asia, Africa, and the Malay Archipelago are so termed; so are some of the South American insectivorous Chiroptera; so are several genera of the Phyllostomatidae (see figure at BAT), especially the perfectly harmless Phyllostoma spectrum, two feet in expanse of wing, with a well-developed nose-leaf. The real blood-suckers belong to the genera Desmodus and Diphylla, forming the family Desmodidae, found in Central and South America. These have a bifid foliaceous appendage, two large projecting incisor teeth, and two lancet-shaped superior canines, and they attack cattle and horses and sometimes human beings when asleep.