"Redbreast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... elements Of thy trim Mansion destined soon to blaze 30 In snow white splendour, [B] [7]—think again; and, taught By old Sir William and his quarry, leave Thy fragments to the bramble and the rose; There let the vernal slow warm sun himself, And let the redbreast hop from stone ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... begin to show belief, The maple crimsons to a coral-reef, Then saffern swarms swing off from' all the willers So plump they look like yaller caterpillars, Then gray hossches'nuts leetle hands unfold Softer'n a baby's be at three days old Thet's robin-redbreast's almanick; he knows Thet arter this ther' 's only blossom-snows So, choosin' out a handy crotch an' spouse, He goes to plast'rin' his adobe house. Then seems to come a hitch,—things lag behind, Till some fine mornin' ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various
... Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut ice in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and Henry was babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the topmost bough. Him and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and toted that phonograph around, and had wassail and diversions. Everywhere we found doors open we went inside and set the machine going, and Mellinger called ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... grave — the necessary ropes had been forgotten: so we drew back from it, and waited in silence watching the big flakes fall gently one by one like heavenly benedictions, and melt in tears on Harry's pall. But that was not all. A robin redbreast came as bold as could be and lit upon the coffin and began to sing. And then I am afraid that I broke down, and so did Sir Henry Curtis, strong man though he is; and as for Captain Good, I saw him turn away too; even in my own distress I could ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard
... head of this true daughter of the North, still crowned her hood; and, as she threw back her brown cloak and disclosed a plump little scarlet jacket and brown skirt, the consul could not resist her suggested likeness to some bright-eyed robin redbreast, to whom the inclement weather had given a charming audacity. And shy and demure as she still was, it was evident that some change had been wrought in her other than that evoked by the stimulus of ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... soul-like murmurs into the lurid reek; for as yet leaves and flowers and blue skies and pure breezes were not,—nothing but whiffs of mephitic and lethal vapor ascending, as from a vast charcoal brazier. No lark or linnet or redbreast or mocking-bird could live, much less warble, in those carbonic times. The world, like a Mississippi steamer, was coaling, with an eye to the needs of its future biped passengers. The embryotic earth was then truly ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... of the death-bed; and when these are more than usually severe, it is attributed to this cause, and the reason given 'because the bird has no gall' is to them quite conclusive, but to me, perfectly irrelevant and unsatisfactory. A belief amongst boys, that to harm or disturb the nests of the redbreast or swallow is unlucky, appears very general throughout the kingdom; and the keen bird-nester, who prides himself on the quantity of eggs blown and strung bead-fashion, here often gets mortified by finding his trophies destroyed by ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... the field, and we sate, or rather reclined, round a temperate repast, our cloth spread upon the hay, while Mr Burchell gave cheerfulness to the feast. To heighten our satisfaction two blackbirds answered each other from opposite hedges, the familiar redbreast came and pecked the crumbs from our hands, and every sound seemed but the echo of tranquillity. 'I never sit thus,' says Sophia, 'but I think of the two lovers, so sweetly described by Mr Gay, who were struck dead in each other's arms. There is something so pathetic in the description, ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith
... walked by Robin, And thus to him did say: "Pray mark, friend Robin Redbreast, That Goldfinch ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... you were digging in the field near the river, three months ago, you found a robin redbreast ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... "Robin Redbreast has a blithe interpreter," said Willy Ray, as he leaned for a moment against the open door of the dairy in passing out. Rotha was there singing, while in a snow-white apron, and with arms bare above the elbows, she weighed the butter of the last churning into ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... the spirit universal. There is but one life and one spirit, though the degrees of its manifestation are wide as the poles asunder: just as in our own body there are specialised cells for high tasks and for lowly, yet the same life pervades them all. There is a wild robin redbreast who always comes when I dig my garden, to eat the grubs that the spade turns up. He is not in the least afraid, and he often answers when I whistle to him: he is a little cousin of mine. His life is in no essentials different to my own ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt |
