NATURE'S CAROL SINGERS. 



THE ROBIN. 



I LOVE Robin Redbreast 

 above all other birds. 

 He is a bold, handsome 

 fellow, and one of the 

 sweetest songsters 

 of the grove. When 

 the Nightingale and 

 the Blackcap have 

 gone to their winter 

 quarters in the far- 

 away sunny South, and 

 both the Thrush and the 

 Skylark are silent, courageous Redbreast 

 mounts to the topmost branch of some 

 sodden, leafless tree and defiantly pours 

 out his sweet, silvery notes. 



Poets of all ages have noticed this 

 peculiar characteristic, and one of them 

 has expressed it very happilv in the 

 following lines : 



" Each woodland pipe is mute 

 Save when the Redbreast mourns the ialhng leafs ; 

 Now plaintively, in interrupted trills, 

 He sings the dirge of the departing year." 



i6 



