VESPERTILIONIDIE, a family of bats including the great majority of s 11 insectivorous species, and especially characteristic of temperate regions. In this family the muzzle has no nose-leaf, the pre maxillary bones are. defective and separated by a wide median vacuity, the number of incisor teeth is usually two on each side above and three below, and the tail is nearly or quite in cluded in the interfemoral extension of the wing-membrane. With the exception of a few foun.d along the southern borders all of the bats of the United States belong to this family, nine !genera and about 25 well-marked species being included. Among them may be mentioned the long-eared bat (Corynorhinus macrotis), typify ing the subfamily Plecotinm, in which the bases of the ears are joined across the top of the head, and which is found in the Southern States north to Virginia, the well known and variable little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus), so abund ant everywhere in the east, and represented by closely related species westward, the pretty and equally abundant red bat (Tanurus borealis), the larger and tauch rarer hoary bat (T. cine reus) which, like some other species, is a regu lar migrant, the larger brown bat (Vesper:Ili° buscus), the twilight bat (Nycticebus hunierelit) and .the pipistrelle (Pipistrellus subfiavus), all of which are more or less plentiful in the East ern States and whose habits are generally sinu lar and familiar. A very distinct species of California and the Sputhwest is Antrosous pal lidus, which has only two incisors on each side below and a slightly marked nasal fold. It be longs to the subfamily Antrozoinee. Consult Miller, (North American Fauna No. 13) (Washington 1897), and Allen, (Monograph of North American Bats,) 'United States National Museum Bulletin, No: 43.
vEsPucci, vs-poo'eh6, Amerigo fLatin ired AMERICUS VESPUCIUS), Italian navigator: b. Florence, 18 March 1452; d. Seville, 22 Feb. 1512. He acquired in some fashion 4an excel lent practical knowledge of astronomy,)) and was the greatest expert of his day in the calcu lation of latitude and longitude. A clerk in the commercial office of. the Medici at Florence, he made an avocation of the study of geography and the collection of globes, charts and maps, He became, too, a skilled map draughtsman. Some time between the middle of 1489 and the end of 1491 he was sent to Barcelona as repre sentative of the Medid in connection with Spanish business interests of importance; and in 1493 he became connected with the commer cial house of Juanoto Berardi at Seville. Be rardi was in the employ of the Spanish Crown, and fitted out vessels for expeditions across the Atlantic. In 1495 he signed a contract for supplying 12 vessels of 900 tons burden in ag gregate; and when he died in December, Ves pucci settled the remainder of the contract and the various obligations in connection therewith. It is thus probable that Vespucci participated in the fitting out of Columbus' second voyage. Knowledge of Vespucci's career between early in 1496 and late in 1504 is based on two letters written by him, one (March or April 1503) to Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de' Medici, the other (4 Sept 1504) to Piero Soderini, gonfaloniere of Florence. The latter gives an account of
four voyages in which the writer took a part, the earlier two in the service of Spain, the lat ter two in that of Portugal. The first expedi tion started from Cadiz port 10 May 1497 and returned 15 Oct 1498, and Vespucci accom panied it as gastronomer.) Hence, to all in tents and purposes the voyage was his. As an officer of such importance, then Vespucci sailed. His account above mentioned is a cursory epistle, not an official report, and, therefore, of course—but unfortunately — fails to supply many details that would now be of great value. He does, however, tell something of the flora and fauna of the regions visited, the natives and their customs. The letter to Soderini got into print in two editions, though it is highly improbable that Vespucci had any part in their appearance. The letter says that the expedition, after running to the Canaries, made land 1,000 leagues about west-southwest from those is lands, coasted for 870 leagues along a shore so extensive that it was thought that of a conti nent, passed 37 days in a fine harbor and then returned to Spain. Vespucci, then, probably sailed from Cape Honduras to a point not far from Cape Canaveral, Fla. 'rims he visited what he thought was the continent of Asia, but was really that of America, a year before Co lumbus. Owing either to a typographical error or the arbitrary altemtion of an editor, a proper name Lariab, in the Italian version, has -become Parias in the Latin. Lariab was apparently a name belonging to the country of the Huastecas around the river Panuco, while Parias was a name of a region 2,400 miles distant, on the South American east coast. This confusion of Lariab and Parias occurred despite the fact that Vespucci scrupulously gives latitudes and longi tudes. As a matter of fact, at the time of the writing of the letter (1504), Columbus was sup posed to have discovered Asia by a new route in 1492, and-Vespucci, had he wished to antedate Columbus, must have placed his first voyage be fore that date. In the letter to Lorenzo de Medici, regarding his third voyage only (14 May 1501-7 Sept 1502), Vespuca refers to the re gions visited (The Brazil coast to lat. 34° S., naming thence southeast to South Georgia Island) as a snew worid,s because unknown to the ancients. One Giocondo, who prepared a Latin version, apparently from the Italian man uscript original, gave his rendering (1504) the title (Mundus Novus.' This was put dcrwn as equivalent to what is now known as Brazil. Then the suggestion was given that Mundus Novus was the so-called Fourth Part of the earth, and ought to be called America, from its supposed discoverer, though as we now know Columbus had already reached it. Thus the name came to be equivalent to South America, and finally to the two continents. Consult the critical and biographical notes by Winsor in his 'History,' Vol. II (1886) ; Fiske, 'The Discov ery of America) (1892) ; Harrisse, 'Discovery of North America) (1892). •