12 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
that this skull here, lying so light in the palm of the 
hand, with the bright sunshine falling on it,and a sha- 
dowy darkness in the vacant orbits of the eyes, fills us 
with sadness. ‘As leaves on leaves, so men on men 
decay ;’ how much more so with these creatures whose 
generations are so short! 
If we look closely into the grass here on the slope 
of the fosse it is animated by a busy throng of insects 
rushing in hot haste to and fro. They must find it a 
labour and a toil to make progress through the green 
forest of grass-blade and moss and heaths and thick 
thyme bunches, over-topping them as cedars, but cedars 
all strewn in confusion, crossing and interlacing, with 
no path through the jungle. Watch this ant travelling 
patiently onward, and mark the distance traversed by 
the milestone of a tall bennet. 
First up ona dry white stalk of grass lingering 
from last autumn ; then down on toa thistle leaf, 
round it, and along a bent blade leading beneath into 
the intricacy and darkness at the roots. Presently, 
after a prolonged absence, up again on a dead fibre of 
grass, brown and withered, torn up by the sheep but 
not eaten: this lies like a bridge across a yawning 
chasm—the mark or indentation left by the hoof of a 
horse scrambling up when the turf was wet and soft. 
Half-way across the weight of the ant overbalances it, 
slight as that weight is, and down it goes into the 
cavity: undaunted, after getting clear, the insect 
begins to climb up the precipitous edge and again 
