342 THE ROBINS' NEST. CHAP. XVI. 



gardening. His uniform kindness and good temper, 

 and his communicative, intelligent disposition, made 

 him a great favourite with the neighbouring farmers, 

 to whom he would volunteer much valuable advice on 

 agricultural operations, drainage, ploughing, and labour- 

 saving processes. Sometimes he took a long rural ride 

 on his favourite " Bobby," now growing old, but as fond 

 of his master as ever. Towards the end of his life, 

 " Bobby " lived in clover, its master's pet, doing no 

 work ; and he died at Tapton in 1845, more than twenty 

 years old. 



During one of George's brief sojourns at the Grange, 

 he found time to write to his son a touching account of 

 a pair of robins that had built their nest within one of 

 the empty upper chambers of the house. One day he 

 observed a robin fluttering outside the windows, and 

 beating its wings against the panes, as if eager to gain 

 admission. He went up stairs, and there found, in a 

 retired part of one of the rooms, a robin's nest, with one 

 of the parent birds sitting over three or four young- 

 all dead. The excluded bird outside still beat against 

 the panes ; and on the window being let down, it flew 

 into the room, but was so exhausted that it dropped 

 upon the floor. Mr. Stephenson took up ' the bird, 

 carried it down stairs, and had it warmed and fed. The 

 poor robin revived, and for a time was one of his pets. 

 But it shortly died too, as if unable to recover from the 

 privations it had endured during its three days' fluttering 

 and beating at the windows. It appeared that the room 

 had been unoccupied, and, the sash having been let 

 down, the robins had taken the opportunity of building 

 their nest within it ; but the servant having closed the 

 window again, the calamity befel the birds which so 

 strongly excited Mr. Stephenson' s sympathies. An in- 

 cident such as this, trifling though it may seem, gives a 

 true key to the heart of the man. 



The amount of his Parliamentary business having 



