True, along with the totemic ideas of animal ancestors we very early find indefinite and not infrequently grotesque ideas of human ancestors. In the 'Mura-mura' legends of southern Australia these ideas are so interwoven that they can scarcely be untangled. These Mura-mura are fanciful beings of an earlier age, who are represented as having transmitted magical implements to the generations of the present era and as having instructed the ancestors of the Australians in magical ceremonies. A few of the legends relate that the Mura-mura also created the totem animals, or transformed themselves into the latter. Here, then, we already find a mutual interplay between ideas of human and conceptions of animal ancestors. As yet, however, no clear-cut idea of a _human_ ancestor has been formed. This never occurs--a fact of prime importance as concerns its development--until the _totem ancestor_ has lost his significance, and the original tribal totemism has therefore become of subordinate importance, even though totemism itself has not as yet completely disappeared. Under such circumstances the totem animal becomes the protective animal of the _individual_; the animal ancestor is displaced by the demon which mysteriously watches over the individual's life. This transition has already been touched upon in connection with the development of totemic ideas. Coincident with it, there is an important change with respect to the character of the totem animal. The tribal totem is an animal species. The Australian, whose totem, let us say, is the kangaroo, regards all kangaroos which he meets as sacred animals; he may not kill them, nor, above all, eat of their flesh. In the above-mentioned development of totemism (which is at the same time a retrogression) the totem animal becomes individualized. The protective animal--or the animal of destiny, as we might refer to it, in view of its many changes in meaning--is but an individual animal. A person may possibly never have seen the animal that keeps guard over him; nevertheless, he believes that it is always near at hand. The unseen animal which thus accompanies him is therefore sometimes also called his 'bush soul'; it is hidden somewhere in the bushes as a sort of animal double. Whatever befalls the person likewise happens to it, and conversely. For this reason it is very commonly believed that, if this animal should be killed, the person also must die. This makes it clear why the North American Indian calls the animal, not his ancestor, but his 'elder brother.'