OUR ANCESTORS. 237 



heterogeneous British nation, so inextricably inter- 

 mixed that its ethnology can now only be re-con- 

 structed in the rough. But all through, each earlier 

 element has everywhere persisted in the resulting* 

 mixture, and it is probable that the numerical pro- 

 portion of all the older elements, especially the 

 Euskarian, is far greater than people generally at all 

 imagine. 



TEE BEETLE'S VIEW OF LIFE. 



BY GRANT ALLEN. 



HEEE on a yellow crocus, buried deep in the beautiful 

 golden cup, I have found a little bronze-mailed beetle, 

 stealing the pollen as hard as he can eat it, and 

 hugely enjoying his plentiful morning feast. I have 

 picked him carefully out with a little bit of stick, and 

 I have got him here now crawling about suspiciously 

 upon my hand, and trying to find out what is the best 

 way down from that unpleasantly warm and danger- 

 ously mobile valley the hollow of my palm. I often 

 wish I could discover how the world looks to that 

 small creature here ; and, perhaps, the question is not 

 quite so unanswerable as it appears at first sight. 

 When one remembers that brain and nervous system 

 are on the whole a good index of mind, and that 



