Some Notes on Malayan Folk-Lore of Natural History

A strange superstition is attached to a small snail which frequents the neighbourhood of the limestone hills in Perak. It belongs to the Cyclophoridse^ and is probabiy an Alycams. Among the grass in the shadow of a grazing animal these creatures are to be discovered, and if one of them is crusht^d it will be found to be full of blood, which has been drawn in a mysterious way from the veins of the animal through its shadow. Where these noxious snails abound the cattle be- come emaciated and sometimes even die from the constant loss of blood. In the folk-lore of other countries many parallels to this occur, but they differ in either the birds, bats or vampires, who are supposed to prey on the life-blood of their fellows, going direct to the animals to suck the blood instead of doing so through the medium of their shadows.