Vampire, a spectral being clothed with a human body which is reputed among the people living on the lower Danube to leave the grave at night and suck the warm blood of living people while they sleep. The term is therefore applied to people who prey upon their fellows. Anyone whose death is caused by a vampire will become a vampire. The vampire-bat is a term applied to several different species of tropical bats. Most of them are fruit eaters, but one or two actually suck the blood of horses and cattle, and, it is said, will even attack people in their sleep. The javelin bat of Mexico, four inches long, is quite given to drawing blood from the toe or nose of a sleeping native. The bite is annoying enough, but it is not dangerous. It is Just possible that the superstitious notion of the vampire may have been derived from the blood-sucking propensity of such a bat.