By Jeremy Clay

That’s it. We’re done. Call off the search. We’ve found the new David Attenborough.

Alice Roberts is a near-enough perfect fit. She’s wise, warm and well-to-do, which are the essentials, and she’s winsome to boot, which is an added bonus.

Now all she needs to do to inherit the crown is learn something about animals.

“Is that a lion?” she gasped on The Incredible Human Journey (9.30pm, BBC2), spooked by the mournful wails of a distant predator, as she bedded down with her camera in the coal-black night of the African savanna.

“Is it a leopard?” she whispered, as it drew nearer. “Is it a hyena?”

Or a shark, perhaps, Alice? Or a Gruffalo?

Hmmm. She’s probably got quite a lot of brushing up to do on her beastie-recognition skills before she can step into the great man’s shoes.

But Roberts is only in her mid-thirties and she’s already a doctor, an anatomist, an anthropologist, a lecturer and a TV presenter.

Hell at one point in this film she even seemed to be flying a small plane. She could probably fit a PhD in zoology between the premiere of her next symphony and the publication of her debut collection of poetry.

For now though, she’s contenting herself with explaining the entire history of man.

This is the story of us, from the cradle of humanity in Ethiopia’s Rift Valley right up to – I dunno – Dean Gaffney.

That’s a big old topic for a Sunday night series, but like Attenborough himself, Roberts is a good guide, making complex matters seem straightforward without having to dumb down.

You may have seen Roberts before. She's had cameos on Coast and Time Team, and the BBC road-tested her with a schedule-filler called Don't Die Young. But this is the show that will make her name.

And it’s that scene in the dead-of-night that will have clinched it.

First she made herself a den out of thorny branches. Then she waved goodbye to the film crew. Then, armed only with a torch and a camera, and looking for all the world like she was re-enacting the Blair Witch Project, she settled down for a night serenaded by the howls of things that would like to scoff her.

Happily Roberts didn’t get eaten, and was soon striding around purposefully in 40 degree heat.

Even that was impressive. Alice’s T-shirt remained as dry as a dead camel’s gob. If the new Attenborough thing doesn't work out for her, perhaps she could land a sponsorship deal with an underarm deodorant manufacturer.

*The Islands of Britain (9pm, ITV) is gentle, genial TV with an agreeable theme and a cheerful, good-natured host in Martin Clunes.

Last night, Clunes reached the Isle of Man, where he met several people who’d got rich in a tax-free way and were eager to tell him about it.

“I wonder if there’s a Viking word for smug?” he said, with sudden venom. Which was as unexpected as hearing a nun belch.