140 SPRING-TIDE. 



7. What could have given rise to the 

 story of the robin covering the dead bodies 

 of human creatures? 



S. It may be traced, perhaps, to the 

 popular ballad, but it is possible that the 

 simple rhyme embalms an ancient super- 

 stition. In an old play the wren is made 

 to join in this pious office : 



" Call for the robin redbreast and the wren 

 Since o'er shady groves they hover, 

 And with leaves and flow'rs do cover 

 The friendless bodies of unburied men." 



The fondness of the robin for his summer 

 haunts is well described in these lines : 



" Some redbreasts love amid the deepest groves 

 Retired to pass the summer days. Their song 

 Among the birchen bougns, with sweetest fall 

 Is warbled, pausing, then resumed more sweet, 

 More sad, that to an ear grown fanciful, 

 The babes, the wood, the men, rise in review, 

 And robin still repeats the tragic line." 



But it is in the winter that robin's fami- 

 liarity increases. When the wind whistles 

 sharply through the leafless thicket, and the 



