132 THE EEDBREAST. 



now extended to other parts of the house. If the door or window of the 

 dining room was left open for a short time, we were sure to see our little 

 friend performing the duty of gathering up the crumbs beneath our table, 

 and then taking his favourite station on the top of an argand lamp, which 

 stood on the sideboard. Here he would, in general, content himself with 

 watching the proceedings of the family ; and we were occasionally favoured 

 with a song, the notes of which were so sweet and clear, and yet subdued, 

 that, for the time, we were wont to praise his name above that of all the 

 songsters of the spring. It was now no unusual thing to find our robin in 

 the sleeping apartments, or in those devoted to study ; and when it was 

 wished to exclude him from either of these rooms, and the windows were set 

 open for that purpose, we were sometimes highly amused to find, that no 

 sooner had we driven him out in that direction, than, with his rapid flight, 

 he immediately entered the house again through the kitchen, and was wing- 

 ing his way up stairs to the same apartment he had just been compelled to 

 quit. 



For a time, the excessive freedom of our guest was borne without com- 

 plaint, and his visits afforded much pleasure and diversion to the younger 

 branches of the family ; but, at length, when every room in the house was 

 subject to his intrusions — when he made the nursery his sleeping apartment, 

 joined the family at breakfast, alighting on the table, and picking holes in 

 the butter, — when he not only demanded our hospitality on his own account, 

 but brought one of his acquaintances to share in it, and when the tarnished 

 state of the furniture reminded us, that however interesting it may be to have 

 tame birds flying about our apartments, it is a pi'actice wholly irreconcilable 

 with the maxims of neatness, — we were obliged, at last, to concur in the 

 decision, that our presuming friend must be banished the house. But this 

 was a thing more easily talked of than done. The doors and windows could 

 not always be kept shut, nor could we be so constantly on the watch to ex- 

 clude the bird, as he was on the watch to come in. This being the case, an 

 expedient was resorted to. The robin was caught, put into a basket, and 

 carried to a village about a mile distant. Having set him at liberty, the 

 messenger returned homewards ; but long before he reached our residence, 

 the robin was at his former post, and taking advantage of the unguarded 

 state of the house — had triumphantly effected an entrance. That it was the 

 same bird, we could not for a moment doubt, for we had, by long companion- 

 ship, become so well acquainted with his fonn and habits, that we were able 

 to point him out as " our robin " when associated with other birds upon the 

 house. Another week was now allowed to pass by, without any attempt to 

 rid ourselves of an annoyance which seemed without remedy. But on the 

 occasion of a visit of the family to a country town, about seven miles ofi", it 

 occurred to the mistress of the house that the robin might as Avell go too — 

 that ho might like the town better than the country. Again we succeeded 



