“Our Robin is a big-bodied Thrush, whereas the Robin-redbreast, the Cock Robin of story, is more nearly akin in size and build to our Bluebird. If you want to see the family marks that yoke the Robin to his Thrush cousin, look carefully at the youngsters as they are leaving the nest, and you will see that instead of wearing plain brick-coloured breasts like the parents, they are striped like the Thrushes; this marking disappears after their first moult. As for Robin himself, you know him well, but can any of you tell exactly the colour of his clothing?”
Sarah and Tommy raised their hands at the same time, but as ladies come first, Sarah began: “He is gray on top, and red underneath, and he’s got white spots outside of his wings.”
“Very good, indeed,” said Gray Lady; “but can you add anything to that, Tommy?”
“Yes, ma’am; he’s black on top of his head, and he’s got a white chin and eye spot and a yellow beak.”
“Why, Tommy, that is really very good; I didn’t know that any of you children had learned to look so carefully and remember.”
“I saw all that yesterday,” said Tommy, in a state of glee. “There came a flock of bran’-new fresh birds, and sat in the cedar bushes back of the barn, but they didn’t find many berries, because the winter birds have eaten them. Ma gave me some old cake to crumble up, and I put some on the top of the stone fence, and some right on the shed, and this morning when I first looked out, a couple of them were out there eating it, and I got a good square look at them. They liked that cake because it had currants in it.”
“So Tommy is the first to report a ‘bran’-new’ Robin flock,” said Gray Lady. “Now that they have really come, will any of the others tell me what they know about Robins? Begin at Sarah’s end of the table.”
“Robins build mud nests before there are any leaves to hide them, and cats often get them when they are sitting,” said Sarah; “and then by and by, when they build another nest, maybe they’ll put it out on a branch that’s weak, and when it storms and the nest gets wet and heavy, it falls down all of a lump. They seem to get along best when they come under the porch or get in a high up crotch.”
“I like Robins,” said Eliza, who sat next, “because they stay around and let you look at them; but I think that they aren’t very clever birds, for instead of keeping quiet when anything comes near the nest, they holler like everything, so that you can tell just where it is. We had a nest in the grape-vine outside the kitchen window, and you couldn’t believe what those little birds ate in one day. I had the mumps and had to stay inside, so I watched them. They ate all the time, that is, in turn, for the old birds seemed to know just which one had food last. Sometimes, if they had a little worm or a bug, they gave it all to one, but if it was one of those long, rubberneck earthworms, they would twist it and bite pieces off and ram one down each throat.
