REDBREAST. 65 



I so well remember, and which were quite white and 

 spotless. He also tells me since of a nest and eggs 

 taken near Exeter on New Year's Day, 1853. My 

 friend E. C. Taylor, Esq., of Kirkham Abbey, Yorkshire, 

 has forwarded me one of the like colour, found in a 

 nest in that beautiful neighbourhood, my own, as I may 

 call it, through the tie of property and former residence. 



One is greyish white, spotted with yellowish red, 

 and brownish red, with which the base is much covered. 



A second is greyish white, spotted with light rust- 

 red, but most so at the thicker end. 



A third is greyish, with light yellowish red spots 

 all over, run together at the base. 



I may here perhaps make the following quotation 

 from my 'History of British Birds:' 



'Gentle reader, if indeed you be of gentle blood, 

 and will read the following touching lines of the poet 

 Thomson, descriptive of the return of a bereaved parent 

 bird to her robbed home, if ever you have plundered 

 a Robin's nest, or that of any other bird, let me hope 

 that you will 'steal no more:' 



-'To the ground the vain provision falls! 



Her pinions ruffle, and, low drooping, scarce 



Can bear the mourner to the poplar shade, 



Where, all abandoned to despair, she sings 



Her sorrows through the night, and on the bough 



Sole sitting, still at every dying fall 



Takes up again her lamentable strain 



Of winding woe, till wide around the woods 



Sigh to her song, and with her wail resound.' 



'Here is no 'poetic license,' but if you think 

 there is, the following well-written 'plain prose' of 

 the amiable Mr. Jesse will satisfy the possible 



VOL. II. K 



