"Redbreast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... had doubtless been brought up, like the rest of us, on "The Babes in the Wood," named the bird after the only heroes in that melancholy tale; but in reality the American robin is a much larger bird than the English robin-redbreast and less brilliantly colored. John Burroughs calls him, of all our birds, "the most ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... where he is better known as St Mungo. Kentigern was one among a parcel of neophyte boys whom the worthy old Serf, or Servanus, was perfecting in the knowledge of the truth. Their teacher had a feathered pet—"quaedam avicula quae vulgo ob ruborem corpusculi rubisca nuncupatur"—a robin-redbreast, in fact, an animal whose good fortune it is never to be mentioned without some kindly reference to his universal popularity, and the decoration which renders him so easily recognised wherever he appears. St Serf's robin was a wonderful bird; he not only took ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... you was should have come to be a rich man. For there wasn't nothin' to be made of you. You would never sit still to wind more than a hank of yarn at a time, that you wouldn't. Off you went to your tomtit boxes an' your robin redbreast snares—they was all you cared about. Isn't it the truth ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume I • Gerhart Hauptmann
... Redbreast lost his heart, He was a gallant bird; He doffed his hat to Jenny, And thus ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... trunk to caress his new master, and passing on to rest under the shadow of some stately tree; the horse, with his arching neck and prancing movements; the fond dog; the gentle sheep; the peacock, with its plumes of blue, and green, and gold; the majestic snow-white swan; the little linnet; the robin-redbreast; and that most beautiful, tiny creature, the humming-bird; the gay butterfly; the bee. It is impossible to go over the names of even what we know by sight, of the good creatures of God, who on that sixth day of the creation came about our ...
— Kindness to Animals - Or, The Sin of Cruelty Exposed and Rebuked • Charlotte Elizabeth
... not a robin, nor does it seem to be nearly related to the familiar redbreast; Pekin- or China-robin is merely the name the dealers give it, because a great many specimens are imported from China. Its classical name is Liothrix lutea. Oates calls it the red-billed liothrix. It ...
— Birds of the Indian Hills • Douglas Dewar
... Mary Antony, pointing, with knobby forefinger, to the first, "is the Reverend Mother, Herself—large, and pure, and noble. . . . Nay, hop not too close, Sir Redbreast! When we enter her chamber we kneel at the threshold, till she bids us draw nearer. True, we are merely soberly-clad, holy women, whereas thou art a gay, gaudy man; bold-eyed, and, doubtless, steeped in sin. But even thou must keep thy distance, in presence ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay
... into marrying the solid, substantial business man beside her, who enjoyed delight in the spectacle of cats and rats walking the tight-rope in amity, and who was blissfully unaware that she was the Robin Redbreast in a cage that put all heaven in ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... soft and plaintive, Now distant and now near, Is the voice of Robin Redbreast, That in the ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... Sat upon a tree, Up went the Pussy-Cat, And down went he; Down came Pussy-Cat, Away Robin ran, Says little Robin Redbreast— Catch me if you can. Little Robin Redbreast jumped upon a spade, Pussy-Cat jumped after him, and then he was afraid. Little Robin chirped and sung, and what did pussy say? Pussy-Cat said Mew, mew mew,—and ...
— The Only True Mother Goose Melodies - Without Addition or Abridgement • Munroe and Francis
... envy and malice amongst them, for him to pronounce any of them deserving or capable of being happy; but I wonder,' says he, 'why the dove alone is absent from this meeting?' 'I know of one in her nest hard by,' answered the redbreast, 'shall I go and call her?' 'No,' says the eagle, 'since she did not obey our general summons, 'tis plain she had no ambition for a public preference; but I will take two or three chosen friends, and we will go softly ...
— The Governess - The Little Female Academy • Sarah Fielding
... The roof, though moveable through all its length, As the wind sways it, has yet well suffic'd, And, intercepting in their silent fall The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me. No noise is here, or none that hinders thought. The redbreast warbles still, but is content With slender notes, and more than half suppress'd. Pleas'd with his solitude, and flitting light From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes From many a twig the pendent drop of ice, That tinkle ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... waggons loaded with brushwood and logs. The ground had become more solid, and in places was touched with frost. Already had the snow begun to fall and the branches of the trees were covered with rime like rabbit-skin. Already on frosty days the robin redbreast hopped about on the snow-heaps like a foppish Polish nobleman, and picked out grains of corn; and children, with huge sticks, played hockey upon the ice; while their fathers lay quietly on the stove, issuing forth at intervals with lighted pipes in their lips, to growl, in ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... subtler demands. No doubt there was protection also—protection for sport, for utility, for aesthetic reasons, and because of humane sentiments; even wholesome superstitions have safeguarded the robin redbreast and the wren. There were introductions too—the rabbit for utility, the pheasant for sport, and the peacock for amenity. And every introduction, every protection, every killing out had its ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... looks forth upon the white world, his gaze is more particularly directed to this avenue, as though the form of the intelligent Mr. Mole was an object of interest. From time to time Mr. Verdant Green consults his watch in a nervous manner, and is utterly indifferent to the appeals of the robin-redbreast who is hopping about outside, in expectation of the dinner which has been daily given ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... lost the sight of one eye. Through kind care he has become well and strong, but he is much at the mercy of his enemies, who often attack him on his blind side. The conservatory, dining-room, and drawing-rooms have each their little redbreast visitor; the latter is so tame he will take meal-worms from my hand, and sits on my inkstand singing a sweet, low song whilst I write. As long as each bird keeps to his domain there is peace, but woe to any intruder! The conflicts are desperate, and I have often to mediate, and separate ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... pleasure. The gratifying news encouraged me in the hope that now the nature of the disorder is comprehended her legs will—notwithstanding the process may be gradual—ultimately get quite well. The pretty Robin Redbreast which lay ensconced in your epistle, conveyed to me, in terms more eloquent than words, how much you desired me those Compliments which the little missive he bore in his bill expressed; the emblem is sweetly pretty, and now that we are again allowed to felicitate ...
— Essays on Life, Art and Science • Samuel Butler
... and thus to him did say, "Pray, mark, friend Robin Redbreast, that Goldfinch dress'd ...
— Aunt Kitty's Stories • Various
... the tower, And the redbreast the bower, And the merry little sparrow by the chimney hops, Good e'en, hoots master owl, To-whoo, to-whoo, his troll, Sing heigho, swing the ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... time, when Jenny Wren was young, So daintily she danced and so prettily she sung, Robin Redbreast lost his heart, for he was a gallant bird, So he doffed his hat to Jenny Wren, ...
— Mother Goose - The Original Volland Edition • Anonymous
... mills, gunpowder mills, machines pour remonter les batteaux, machines pour—a great many things which you would like to see I am sure over my father's shoulder. And my aunt would like to see the new staircase, and to see a kitcat view of a robin redbreast sitting on her nest in a sawpit, discovered by Lovell, and you would both like to pick Emmeline's fine strawberries round the crowded oval table after dinner, and to see my mother look so much better ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... be sweet to thee, 65 Whether the summer clothe the general earth With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch Of mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatch Smokes in the sun-thaw; whether the eave-drops fall 70 Heard only in the trances of the blast, Or if the secret ministry of frost Shall ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... glade. The roof, though movable through all its length, As the wind sways it, has yet well sufficed, And, intercepting in their silent fall The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me. No noise is here, or none that hinders thought: The redbreast warbles still, but is content With slender notes and more than half suppressed. Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes From many a twig the pendant drops of ice, ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... Robin must not be confounded with the English Robin Redbreast, although both bear the same name. It is the latter bird in whose praise so much has been written in fable and song. The American Robin belongs to the Thrush family; the Mocking bird, Cat-bird and Brown Thrush, or Thrasher, ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photograph, Volume 1, Number 2, February, 1897 • anonymous
... look that ye fall With dolorous songs funeral, Some to sing, and some to say, Some to weep, and some to pray, Every bird in his lay. The goldfinch and the wagtail; The gangling jay to rail, The flecked pie to chatter Of the dolorous matter; The robin redbreast, He shall be the priest, The requiem mass to sing, Softly warbling, With help of the red sparrow, And the chattering swallow, This hearse for to hallow; The lark with his lung too, The chaffinch and the ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... the high stars alone, Nor in the cup of budding flowers, Nor in the redbreast's mellow tone, Nor in the bow that smiles in showers, But in the mud and scum of things There alway, ...
— Leaves of Life - For Daily Inspiration • Margaret Bird Steinmetz
... in that line. He had quite a fund of canary-bird anecdotes, and the pert ways of birds that picked up worms for a living afforded him infinite amusement. He would give a capital imitation of the way a robin-redbreast cocks his head on one side preliminary to a dash forward in the direction of a wriggling victim. There is a small grave at Gad's Hill to which Dickens would occasionally take a friend, and it was quite a privilege to stand with ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut ice in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and Henry was babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the topmost bough. Him and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and toted that phonograph around, and had wassail and diversions. Everywhere we found doors open we went inside and set the machine going, and Mellinger called upon the people to observe the artful music and his two lifelong friends, ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... Sarah Josepha Hale The Star Jane Taylor "Sing a Song of Sixpence" Unknown Simple Simon Unknown A Pleasant Ship Unknown "I Had a Little Husband" Unknown "When I Was a Bachelor" Unknown "Johnny Shall Have a New Bonnet" Unknown The City Mouse and the Garden Mouse Christina Rossetti Robin Redbreast Unknown Solomon Grundy Unknown "Merry Are the Bells" Unknown "When Good King Arthur Ruled This Land" Unknown The Bells of London Unknown "The Owl and the Eel and the Warming Pan" Laura E. Richards The Cow Ann Taylor The Lamb William Blake Little Raindrops Unknown "Moon, So ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... bird," and makes him "fly before from tree to tree," which is also good. But the bluebird is not strictly a songster in the sense in which the song sparrow or the indigo-bird, or the English robin redbreast, is; nor do Bryant's lines ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... have another original piece, entitled, 'The Redbreast and the Butterfly,' of which our readers will probably be contented with ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... Robin Redbreast sat upon a tree, Up went pussy-cat, and down went he; Down came pussy-cat, and away Robin ran; Said little Robin Redbreast, "Catch ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various
... is an unlucky bird in some places. When the horse-chestnut leaves turn scarlet the redbreast sings in a peculiarly plaintive way, as if in tone with the dropping leaves and the chill air that follows the early morning frost. You may tell how much moisture there is in the air in a given place by the colours of the autumn leaves; the horse-chestnut, scarlet near a stream, ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... titmouse also, The little redbreast have their election, They fly I saw and together gone, Whereas hem list, about environ As they of kinde have inclination, And as nature impress and guide, Of everything ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... of relief, from the table at the farther end of the room, on which those letters, ceremonious and conventional, had been written,—come to the window, which, though mid-winter, was open, and the redbreast, with whom she had made friends, hopped boldly almost within reach, looking at her with bright eyes and head curiously aslant. By the window a single chair, and a small reading-desk, with the book lying open. The short day was not far from its close, but there was ample light ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... excrescence which is often found on the Briar, as caused by the puncture of an insect, and which is known as the canker, or "robin redbreast's cushion," is frequently worn round the neck as a protective amulet against whooping cough. This was called in the old Pharmacopeias "Bedeguar," and was famous for its astringent properties. Hans Andersen names ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... robin-redbreast and the wren, Since o'er shady groves they hover And with leaves and flowers do cover The friendless bodies of unburied men. Call unto his funeral dole The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm And (when gay tombs are robb'd) sustain no harm; But keep the ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... cricket, The wheat-stack for the mouse, When trembling night winds whistle, And moan all round the house. The frosty way like iron, The branches plumed with snow— Alas! in winter, dead and dark, Where can poor Robin go? Robin, Robin Redbreast, O, Robin dear! And a crumb of bread for Robin, His ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... for the robin redbreast and the wren, Since o'er the shady groves they hover, And with leaves and flowers do cover The friendless ...
— Animal Ghosts - Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter • Elliott O'Donnell
... little man, cheerfully. "I never was more surprised in my life, except when my great-aunt's grandmother got into such a rage, and changed me into a robin-redbreast. I tell you, ...
— Little Saint Elizabeth and Other Stories • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... silly Johnny for the older silly Billy, while Jack Pudding is in German Hans Wurst, John Sausage. Only the very commonest names are used in this way, and, if we had no further evidence, the rustic Dicky bird, Robin redbreast, Hob goblin, Tom tit, Will o' the Wisp, Jack o' lantern, etc., would tell us which have been in the past the most popular English font-names. During the Middle Ages there was a kind of race among half a dozen favourite names, the prevailing order being ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... shall I forget your beauteous scenery. Seated in the cool of the evening under one of the noble trees on your shore, the only sounds I heard were the soft ripple of the water, and the late warbling of the redbreast—Yes, I forget the humming beetle as it rapidly passed, and the owl calling to its mate in the distant wood. How peaceful were ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... While the robin redbreast cheers us in England during winter with its song, the beautiful little blue-bird performs the same office with its rich sweet notes to the inhabitants of the United States; arriving from Mexico, and still further off regions, as soon as the first signs of approaching spring appear—even ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... village, not a solitary cottage during the English Middle Ages was unvisited by him who frightened the children; they had a name for him as for the wild birds—Robin Redbreast, Dicky Swallow, Philip Sparrow, Tom Tit, Tom-a-Bedlam. And after him came the "Abram men," who were sane parodies of the crazed, and went to the fairs and wakes in motley. Evelyn says of a fop: "All his body was dressed ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... too sure o' that, Sir,' urged Mr. Weller, shaking his head. 'If you know'd who was near, sir, I rayther think you'd change your note; as the hawk remarked to himself vith a cheerful laugh, ven he heerd the robin-redbreast a-singin' round the corner.' ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... interest of having foreshadowed, by the motto proposed to accompany it, the title of the series of All the Year Round which he was led to substitute for the older series in 1859. "THE ROBIN. With this motto from Goldsmith. 'The redbreast, celebrated for its affection to mankind, continues with us, the year round.'" That however was rejected. Then came: "MANKIND. This I think very good." It followed the other nevertheless. After it came: "And here a strange idea, but with decided advantages. ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... I was reading the account which a boy, who had always lived in town, gave of his first sight of a robin-redbreast. His master told him to write for his composition all about a holiday which the boys had had given them, so he gave an account of how he had gone for a long day in the country with his father and his little sister. Of all the sights he saw that day, none delighted ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham
... here is my place, Master Shelton. This is my native land, this burrow in the earth. Come rain or wind—an whether it's April, and the birds all sing, and the blossoms fall about my bed, or whether it's winter, and I sit alone with my good gossip the fire, and robin-redbreast twitters in the woods—here is my church and market, my wife and child. It's here I come back to, and it's here, so please the saints, that I would like ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... comming of your ioyous make,% And hearken to the birds love-learned song, The deawy leaves among! For they of ioy and pleasance to you sing, 90 That all the woods them answer, and theyr eccho ring. [* Mavis, song-thrush.] [** Descant, variation.] [@ Ouzell, blackbird.] [$ Ruddock, redbreast.] ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... garden—tiny, but so pretty, with its green verandah, its semicircle of arbutus trees serving as a frame to the hilly landscape beyond, its one wavy acacia, woodbine-clasped, at the foot of which a robin-redbreast was hopping and singing over the ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... "A robin redbreast in a cage Puts all heaven in a rage . . . A skylark wounded on the wing Doth make a ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... arrives shortly after Robin Redbreast, with whom he associates both at this season and in the autumn, is the golden-winged woodpecker, alias "high-hole," alias "flicker," alias "yarup," alias "yellow-hammer." He is an old favorite of my boyhood, and his note ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... Boreas, it is pleasant even now to stroll to and fro in the sunshine. The longtailed titmice come along in parties of six or eight, calling to each other as in turn they visit every tree. Turning from watching these—see, a redbreast has perched on a branch barely two yards distant, for, wherever you may be, there the robin comes and watches you. Whether looking in summer at the roses in the garden, or waiting in winter for the pheasant to break cover or the fox to steal forth, go where you will, in a minute or ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... way to turn tailor, or be redbreast teacher. An the indentures be drawn, I'll away within these two hours; and so come ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... to the discernment of the spirit universal. There is but one life and one spirit, though the degrees of its manifestation are wide as the poles asunder: just as in our own body there are specialised cells for high tasks and for lowly, yet the same life pervades them all. There is a wild robin redbreast who always comes when I dig my garden, to eat the grubs that the spade turns up. He is not in the least afraid, and he often answers when I whistle to him: he is a little cousin of mine. His life is in no ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt
... William's arm round the neck of Jane, his face turned close to her's, and his frock pulled over her body. They were covered all over with leaves, which in all that time never withered; and on a bush near this cold grave a Robin-Redbreast watched and chirped—so that many gentle hearts still think that pretty bird did bring the leaves which ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... what I supposed to be the notes of a bird, under or upon the sill of a window. My impression was, that they somewhat resembled the notes of a wild duck in its nocturnal flight, and, at times, the twitter of a redbreast, in quick succession. To be satisfied on the subject, I carefully removed the shutter, and, to my surprise, found it was a garden snail, which, in drawing itself along the glass, had produced sounds similar to those elicited ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 381 Saturday, July 18, 1829 • Various
... The redbreast oft at evening hours Shall kindly lend his little aid, With hoary moss, and gather'd flowers, To deck the ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... that kind of cooking) in a pan over the fire, there is nothing left of a large slice, but a little shrivelled brown bit, swimming in about half a pint of melted lard, not quarter enough to satisfy a great robin redbreast like me; but I make the most of it, by pointing my bread for some time at it, and then eating a lot of bread before I begin at the pork. The pointing, you see, gives the ...
— The Two Story Mittens and the Little Play Mittens - Being the Fourth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... Mary, as blithe as a lark, and as petted as a robin-redbreast, by no means pining, or even hankering, for any other robin. She was not the girl to give her heart before it was even asked for; and hitherto she had regarded the smuggler with pity more than admiration. For in many points she was like her father, ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... wreath so far as to show a projecting turret upon one of the angles of the old fortress, which, long a favourite haunt of the raven, was popularly called the Corbie's Tower. Beneath, the scene was open and lightsome, and the robin redbreast was chirping his best, to atone for the absence of all other choristers. The fine foliage of autumn was seen in many a glade, running up the sides of each little ravine, russet-hued and golden-specked, and tinged frequently with the red hues of the mountain-ash; while here and there a ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... consider a less extreme and more familiar case. We possess a considerable number of birds which, like the redbreast, sparrow, the four common titmice, the thrush, and the blackbird, stay with us all the year round These lay on an average six eggs, but, as several of them have two or more broods a year, ten will be below the average of the year's increase. Such birds as these often live from fifteen to twenty ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... trim pair of boots with low heels. A seal-skin sack, cap, and mittens, with a glimpse of scarlet at the throat, and the pretty curls tied up with a bright velvet of the same colour, completed the external adornment, making her look like a robin redbreast ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... waterpail from a shelf supported by other long pegs, poured its contents into a large cast-iron teakettle swinging over the fire, and whisked out of the door. Presently the notes of her hymn mingled in plaintive harmony with the sparkling but no sweeter song of a robin redbreast, twittering his delight in the warm sunshine amid the crimson apples of the tree ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... Lincoln, Hermit Thrush, Vesper Sparrow, Robin Redbreast, Song Sparrow, Scarlet Tanager, Summer Redbird, Blue Heron, Humming Bird, Yellowbird, Whip-poor-will, Water Wagtail, Woodpecker, Pigeon Woodpecker, Indigo Bird, Yellowthroat, Wilson's Thrush, Chickadee, Kingbird, Swallow, ...
— Bird Day; How to prepare for it • Charles Almanzo Babcock
... beyond match, The scholar bulfinch aims to catch The soft flute's ivory touch; And, careless on the hazle spray, The daring redbreast keeps at bay The ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... flow Of Woodburn's summer rill; A place where all things mournful meet, And yet the sweetest of the sweet, The stillest of the still! With what a pensive beauty fall Across the mossy, mouldering wall That rose-tree's clustered arches! See The robin-redbreast warily, Bright through the blossoms, leaves his nest: Sweet iugrate! through the winter blest At the firesides of men—but shy Through all the sunny summer-hours, He hides himself among the flowers In his own wild festivity. What lulling sound, and shadow ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 266, July 28, 1827 • Various
... together, and liked well on either side. Carlyle should not have said (and still less Norton printed) that Tennyson was a 'gloomy' Soul, nor Thackeray 'of inordinate Appetite,' neither of which sayings is true: nor written of Lord Houghton as a 'Robin Redbreast' of a man. I shall wait very patiently till Mudie sends me Jane Carlyle—where I am told there is a word of not unkindly toleration of me; which, if one be named at all, one ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) • Edward FitzGerald
... a May-day hush Chanteth the Missel-thrush The harp o' the heart makes answer with murmurous stirs; When Robin-redbreast sings, We think on budding springs, And Culvers when they ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Jean Ingelow
... first of June, little Robin, only child of Mr. and Mrs. Redbreast, aged two months, four days, ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow
... silent; the moonlight poured down between us white and wide; there lay a little dead bird on the stones, I remember, a redbreast, stiff and cold. The people traffic in such things here, in the square of Agrippa; it had fallen, doubtless, off some ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... little boy hung down his head, And hid his face, so crimson red; For he stole that pretty nest From little robin redbreast; And he felt so full of shame, I do not like to ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... wandered these poor innocents, Till death did end their grief; In one another's arms they died, As wanting due relief: No burial this pretty pair From any man receives, Till Robin Redbreast piously ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... past! The sear leaves wander, and the hoar of age Gathers her trophy for the dying year, And following in her noiseless pilgrimage, Waters her couch with many a pearly tear. Yet there is one unchanging friend who stays To cheer the passage into Winter's gloom— The redbreast chants his solitary lays, A simple requiem over Nature's tomb, So, when the Spring of life shall end with me, God of my Fathers! may I find a changeless Friend ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 392, Saturday, October 3, 1829. • Various
... Aziola The Marten Judge You as You Are Robert of Lincoln My Doves The Doves of Venice Song of the Dove What the Quail says Chick-a-dee-dee The Linnet Hear the Woodland Linnet The Parrot The Common Question Why not do it, Sir, To-day To a Redbreast Phoebe To the Stork The Storks of Delft The Pheasant The Herons of Elmwood Walter von der Vogelweid The Legend of the Cross-Bill Pretty Birds The Little Bird sits The Living Swan The Stormy Petrel To the Cuckoo Birds ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth
... Robin Redbreast;" during which Charles remarked to Freddy, apparently by way of pressing home the lesson upon ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... "whip-poor-wills," and some other fowl which sing "when lilacs bloom in the garden yard," has neglected, we fear, the wild turkey, simply because the Muse has not given this bird melody, and made it, like the robin-redbreast, which goes so well with bread-crumbs, "an amiable songster." American genius neglects the turkey, and positively takes more interest in the migrations of the transatlantic sparrow. If the nobler fowl can cross ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... foliage dead falls yellow and red, Picturing vainly, but foretelling plainly The wealth of cottage warmth that comes When the frost gleams and the blood numbs, And then, bonny Robin, I'll spread thee out crumbs In my garden porch for thy redbreast pride, The song and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... redbreast oft, at evening hours, Shall kindly lend his little aid, With hoary moss, and gather'd flowers, 15 To deck the ground where ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... to sow the seed they found that they had omitted to provide themselves with wheat! All their labour seemed in vain, and they were greatly distressed as to what they would do for food if they had no harvest to look forward to, when suddenly they saw, perched on a little wayside cross, a tiny robin redbreast holding in its beak an ear of wheat! The monks joyfully took the grain, and, sowing it, reaped an abundant harvest! Accounts vary somewhat in the details of this story. Some say that the bird led the monks to a store of grain, and others question the fact that the bird ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... two and two made four, I felt that five times two were ten, But, as for all profounder lore, The robin redbreast or the wren, The sparrow, whether cock or hen, Knew quite as much about Quadratics, Was less confused by x and n, The deep delights ...
— The Scarlet Gown - being verses by a St. Andrews Man • R. F. Murray
... forge, A foxglove bank in a woodland gorge; Sparks that are struck from red-hot bars, The sun in a mist, and the red star Mars; Flowers of countless shades and shapes, Matadors', judges', and gipsies' capes; The red-haired king who was killed in the wood, Robin Redbreast and little Red Riding Hood; Autumn maple, and winter holly, Red-letter days of wisdom or folly; The scarlet ibis, rose cockatoos, Cardinal's gloves, and Karen's shoes; Coral and rubies, and huntsmen's pink; Red, in short, is splendid, ...
— Verses for Children - and Songs for Music • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... just got Lady Waterford's 'Babes in the Wood,' which are well enough, pretty in Colour: only, why has she made so bad a Portrait of one of her chief Performers, whose Likeness is so easily got at, the Robin Redbreast? This Lady Waterford was at Gillingham this Summer: and my Sister Eleanor said (as Thackeray had done) she was something almost to ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald
... who arrives shortly after Robin-Redbreast, with whom he associates both at this season and in the autumn, is the Golden-Winged Woodpecker, alias, "High-Hole," alias, "Flicker," alias, "Yarup." He is an old favorite of my boyhood, and his note to me ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... a great spider in his mouth; so the Interpreter said, Look here. So they looked, and Mercy wondered; but Christiana said, What a disparagement is it to such a little pretty bird as the robin-redbreast is, he being also a bird above many, that loveth to maintain a kind of socialbleness with man; I had thought they had lived upon crumbs of bread, or upon other such harmless matter; I like him worse than ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... in a subsequent glow, I became infected with the buoyant spirit of all these social surroundings; and felt as light- hearted and "seasonable" as Santa Claus and his wintry comrades, the church bells, little robin redbreast, dog Catch, and Bridget the maid, could ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... this cause, and the reason given 'because the bird has no gall' is to them quite conclusive, but to me, perfectly irrelevant and unsatisfactory. A belief amongst boys, that to harm or disturb the nests of the redbreast or swallow is unlucky, appears very general throughout the kingdom; and the keen bird-nester, who prides himself on the quantity of eggs blown and strung bead-fashion, here often gets mortified by finding his trophies destroyed by the housewife ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... Robert o'Lincoln, Swallow, Vesper Sparrow, Cedar Bird, Hermit Thrush, Cow-bird, Robin Redbreast, Martin, Song Sparrow, Veery, Scarlet Tanager, Vireo, Summer Redbird, Oriole, Blue Heron, Blackbird, Humming Bird, Fifebird, Yellow-bird, Wren, Whip-poor-will, Linnet, Water Wagtail, Pewee, Woodpecker, Phoebe, Pigeon Woodpecker, Yoke Bird, Indigo Bird, ...
— Birds, Illustrated by Color Photography, Vol. II, No 3, September 1897 • Various
... Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana and Tennessee, the Robin-potpie-loving inhabitants must in future content themselves with such game birds as Quail, Grouse, Wild Turkeys, and Ducks. The life of Sir Robin Redbreast has now been declared to be sacred everywhere. He and his mate are to dwell beneath the protection of the strong arm ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson
... singer in England, namely, the robin,—the original robin redbreast,—a slight, quick, active bird with an orange front and an olive back, and a bright, musical warble that I caught by every garden, lane, and hedge-row. It suggests our bluebird, and has similar habits and manners, though it is a much ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... rigorous hours, when down the iron lane The redbreast looks in vain For hips and haws, Lo, shining flowers upon my window-pane The silver pencil ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... moss-hidden Mayflowers will blossom ere long, And gay robin redbreast be trilling a song: But, always before them, I'm sure to be here: 'Tis first Pussy ...
— The Nursery, Volume 17, No. 100, April, 1875 • Various
... paths; and every object wore a look of wretchedness and dilapidation. The only sign of occupancy and life was one grey wreath of smoke, curling heavily from its vent, as if oppressed with the gloom by which it was surrounded. The melancholy note of the redbreast was the only living sound, as the bird came hopping towards him with its usual air of familiarity and respect. Enveloped in a military cloak, and in his cap a dark feather drooping gently over his proud features, the stranger slowly approached the house: a side-door stood partly ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... wakened again by Robin Redbreast. He looked out and saw the sun shining brightly. All that morning the snow melted so fast that by noon there were little rivers and pools of ...
— Bobby of Cloverfield Farm • Helen Fuller Orton
... habitations in this way, as the redbreast does, Mr. Masson replies that the subject of the verb "to come" is, not the skylark, but L'Allegro, the joyous student. I cannot construe the lines as Mr. Masson does, even though the consequence were to convict Milton, a city-bred youth, of not knowing a skylark from a sparrow when he saw it. ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... passed on, and now all the world lay under a pall of white snow. Under their dazzling mantle gleamed the dark prickly leaves of the holly-trees with abundance of scarlet berries. Here and there a little robin-redbreast hopped to and fro, chiefly gathering round the latticed windows of the parsonage, where morning and evening Betty fed ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... sweet jewel, What I have for my darling: A robin-redbreast and a starling. These I give both in hope to move thee; Yet thou say'st I do ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... figure of the Rufous Bar-wing's nest or eggs amongst the original drawings of Mr. Hodgson now in my custody, but in the British Museum series there appears to be, since Mr. Blyth remarks:—"Mr. Hodgson figures the nest of this bird like that of an English Redbreast, with ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... horses, their jingling spurs, their plumed bonnets, and their trim mustachios: they are not of our class, nor will we aim at pairing with them. Tomorrow is St. Valentine's Day, when every bird chooses her mate; but you will not see the linnet pair with the sparrow hawk, nor the Robin Redbreast with the kite. My father was an honest burgher of Perth, and could use his needle as well as I can. Did there come war to the gates of our fair burgh, down went needles, thread, and shamoy leather, and out came the good head piece and target ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... the poor child was to get it; and while he was eating it, a grey owl marched from her nest in the wall, and began picking up the crumbs. This greatly amused little Henry; and, in a few minutes after, there came a great set of sparrows, and a robin-redbreast, and two of them began to fight. And this made Henry laugh; and, on the whole, they so occupied him all day, he was less unhappy than the day before: and, when night came, he lay down near the nest of the owl and her young ...
— The Adventures of Little Bewildered Henry • Anonymous
... spies as related in the Good Book. A mahogany sideboard stood at the upper end of the room; in one window hung a cage which contained a feeble canary. As you entered your eyes fell upon an ornamental wax fruit piece under a conical glass. A stuffed bird, a robin redbreast, perched on a frosted tree in the midst of these pale tropical offerings, glared at you with beady eyes. Antimacassars and other things of horror were in the room. Also a centre table upon which might have been found Cowper's poems, the Bible, Beecher's sermons, and an illustrated ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... that gladden a painter's eye—and the swallows, those summer parasites, taking alarm at the first sharp blast from the north, had departed to prosecute their annual pursuit of sunshine under difficulties, leaving the honest robin redbreast to renew his friendship with the race of men—when I, dissatisfied and anxious about those I was leaving behind me, and nervous in the highest degree as to the result of the struggle for distinction in which I was about to engage, once more took ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... so many varieties of robin as of hawk, but the scientific classifiers are not to be beaten. If they cannot find a number of similar birds to give different names to, they will give two names to the same one. Here are two pictures of your own redbreast, out of the two best modern works on ornithology. In one, it is called "Motacilla rubecula;" in the other, ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... redbreast had been calling his raucous weather warning from the top of one of the trees near the house; but, with her back to the river and the coming storm, the girl in the pavilion gave little heed ...
— Ruth Fielding Down East - Or, The Hermit of Beach Plum Point • Alice B. Emerson
... brewer of the barley, Spake these words in saddened accents: 'Woe is me, my life hard-fated, Badly have I brewed the liquor, Have not brewed the beer in wisdom, Will not live within its vessels, Overflows and fills Pohyola!' "From a tree-top sings the redbreast, From the aspen calls the robin: 'Do not grieve, thy beer is worthy, Put it into oaken vessels, Into strong and willing barrels Firmly bound with hoops of copper.' "Thus was brewed the beer or Northland, At the hands of Osmo's daughter; This the origin of brewing Beer from ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... with snow, and then demands The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, Tamed by the cruel season, crowd around The winnowing store, and claim the little boon Which Providence assigns them. One alone, The redbreast, sacred to the household gods, Wisely regardful of th' embroiling sky, In joyless fields and ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... by the constant gifts of flowers made to her by her friends outside the Convent, and again by the visits of a sweet little redbreast that loved to play about her bed. She saw in these things the Hand of God. "Mother, I feel deeply the many touching proofs of God's Love for me. I am laden with them . . . nevertheless, I continue in the deepest gloom! . . . I suffer much . . . very ...
— The Story of a Soul (L'Histoire d'une Ame): The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux • Therese Martin (of Lisieux)
... boy, with the quickness of a bird, flew to the top of the lodge, and perching upon the highest pole, was instantly changed into a most beautiful robin redbreast. ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... noticing a large hut, which certainly had not been there when last she had come that way. No one was about, so she ventured to peep in, and her surprise was increased at seeing, heaped up in one corner, a quantity of food of all sorts, while a little robin redbreast stood perched on a beam looking down ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... by these special marks: first, you have learned, like Sir Proteus, to wreath your arms like a malcontent; to relish a love-song, like a robin redbreast; to walk alone, like one that had the pestilence; to sigh, like a school-boy that had lost his A B C; to weep, like a young wench that had buried her grandam; to fast, like one that takes diet; to watch, like one that ...
— The Two Gentlemen of Verona • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... known, except to our own people, and they have not in general been exalted by praise above their real merits. We read, both in prose and verse, the praises of the European Lark, Linnet, and Nightingale, and the English Robin Redbreast has been immortalized in song. But the American Robin, (Turdus migratorius,) though surnamed Redbreast, is a bird of different species and different habits. Little has been written about him, and he enjoys but little celebrity; he has never been puffed and overpraised, and, though universally ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... when you were digging in the field near the river, three months ago, you found a robin redbreast caught ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... a bouquet for himself and stuck it in his buttonhole, and after that he hopped away singing a song. And if Robbie Redbreast hadn't heard it I never would have been able to tell it to you. Wasn't it lucky that the little robin sang it to me this morning while I was still in bed? Because, if he hadn't, how would I have ever ...
— Billy Bunny and Uncle Bull Frog • David Magie Cory
... now gave a hero to her romance, a hero whose name was Corambe. He was her ideal, a man whom she had made her god. Whilst blood was flowing freely on the altars of barbarous gods, on Corambe's altar life and liberty were given to a whole crowd of captive creatures, to a swallow, to a robin-redbreast, and even to a sparrow. We see already in all this her tendency to put moral intentions into her romantic stories, to arrange her adventures in such a way that they should serve as examples for making mankind better. These were the novels, with a ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... boy and girl, left to the care of an uncle, who hired two ruffians to murder them, that he might inherit their wealth; one of the ruffians relented, killed his companion, and left the children in a wood, who were found dead in the morning, a redbreast having covered their bodies with strawberry leaves; the uncle was thereafter goaded ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... the calm, sweet air; grey mists drape the fields and hedges. The migratory birds have left, save a few late swallows; and as I sit at work in the soft, still rain, I can hear the blackbird's melancholy trill and the thin pipe of the redbreast's winter song— the air is full ...
— The Roadmender • Michael Fairless
... Robin, Robin-Redbreast, O Robin, Robin dear! O Robin sings so sweetly in the falling ...
— Friends in Feathers and Fur, and Other Neighbors - For Young Folks • James Johonnot
... tedious. It is exactly because he is not tedious, because he does not shoot into German foliosity, that Schlosser finds him 'intolerable.' I have justly transferred to Gulliver's use the words originally applied by the poet to the robin- redbreast, for it is remarkable that Gulliver and the Arabian Nights are amongst the few books where children and men find themselves meeting and jostling each other. This was the case from its first publication, just one ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... upon a tree, Up went Pussy-cat, and down went he; Down came Pussy-cat, and away Robin ran; Says little Robin Redbreast, "Catch me if you can." Little Robin Redbreast flew upon a wall, Pussy-cat jumped after him, and almost got a fall; Little Robin chirp'd and sang, and what did Pussy say? Pussy-cat said "Mew," ...
— Young Canada's Nursery Rhymes • Various
... turned to me and said, 'Fan, do you hear that robin—that little mystic robin-redbreast? Listen, he will sing again in less than twenty seconds.' And almost before he had finished speaking, while I was looking at him, a change came over him, and his face was of the colour of ashes; and he said, with a kind of moan and so low that I could scarcely catch ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... Robin Redbreast. One tradition is that the robin pecked a thorn out of the crown of thorns when Christ was on His way to Calvary, and the blood which issued from the wound, falling on the ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... battered, his stock around his neck was dirty, the brass buttons on his robin-redbreast waistcoat were dull and tarnished, his riding breeches and leggings seemed sworn enemies of brush and polish. But despite all this, one could not get away from the fact that everything the man wore was of the very best and ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... leads, Chides with her dulcet voice the tardy Spring, Bids slumbering Zephyr stretch his folded wing, Wakes the hoarse Cuckoo in his gloomy cave, 140 And calls the wondering Dormouse from his grave, Bids the mute Redbreast cheer the budding grove, And plaintive Ringdove tune her notes ...
— The Botanic Garden. Part II. - Containing The Loves of the Plants. A Poem. - With Philosophical Notes. • Erasmus Darwin
... 'how imagination plays one tricks at times! Once get the idea of a red beard into your mind, and Barbarossa is as often met with as the robin redbreast.' ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease
... first mild day of March, Each minute sweeter than before; The redbreast sings from the tall larch ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... the doorway of a second room, even more miscellaneously filled, a small creature sprang to meet them, kissing Honora, and exclaiming, 'Here you are! Have you brought the pig's wool? Ah! but you've brought something else! No—what's become of that Redbreast!' ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge |
