In Cornwall ants are thought to be the souls of children who died without baptism. Hindus also associate this insect with the souls of the dead, and natives of New Guinea believe that a second death occurs after the first and that the soul is transformed into an ant.
The Athabascan Dog-Ribs believe that an ant inserted beneath the skin of the palm endows the owner of the hand with the gift of prophecy.
The Sudanese think that a wer-man has to approach an ants' nest before being transformed into a hyæna.
Besides the ant the bat is regarded as a mysterious creature, and this form was frequently assumed by Chamalcan, god of the Cakchiquels. Large bats abound in an island on the Ivory Coast in West Africa and are regarded as embodying the souls of the dead. In Tonga the same superstition holds good. Bats and birds appear so similar when flying at dusk that it is natural to find that birds also are often the form in which human spirits take wing.
The Warrar races of Guiana have a very poetical belief about the spirits of the departed. They visit the fair isle of Trinidad,
"Where souls of good men they could find,
In glittering humming-birds confined."
The Arawaks believe that vultures belong to a race which lives in a country above the sky. When at home the vultures cease to be birds and assume the shape and habits of human beings.
The Kalitas hold that when a man dies his soul is carried to spirit-land by a little bird, and if he has been an evil-doer during his lifetime, a hawk overtakes and swallows the bird.
In County Mayo swans are the souls of virgins who have been remarkable for the purity of their lives. This idea is as beautiful as the Bohemian tradition that children hop about the meadows in the form of frogs is quaint.