can long find
the heart to injure Robin Red-Breast.

I do not think it necessary to qualify, or speak of this our fine bird
as the "American robin, or red-breasted thrush," because a different
bird is called the robin in England. This our bird is the Robin; and we
shall call it so without apology, or explanatory adjectives.

The robin songs in the Balm o' Gileads, just across the yard from our
chamber windows, were the matins that often waked us in June, and
sounded in our drowsy ears as we lay, still half asleep, reluctant to
rise and dress. For however it may be with most boys, I am obliged to
confess that both then and later, I was a sleepy-head in the morning;
it always seemed to me on waking, particularly in the summer months,
that I was not half rested, and that I would give almost anything I
possessed for another hour of sleep. As a fact, I now feel sure that I
did not get sleep enough, from half past nine in the evening to five in
the morning; and I think that most boys and girls of thirteen and
fourteen need nine hours of sleep in every twenty-four hours, especially
where they are in active exercise or work throughout the day. It is
really cruel to drive a boy up when he is so shockingly sleepy! There
was always so much going on, that we could not well go to bed till after
nine in the evening, although I would sometimes steal away up-stairs as
soon as it was dark.

Curiously enough it was when I was but about half awake in the morning,
that those robin-songs sounded the most distinctly, and I seemed to hear
every note and trill which they uttered.

"Tulip, tulip, tulip; skillit, skillit,
Tulip, skillit; fill it, fill it, fill it;"--

followed after a moment or two, perhaps, by a shrill and noisy "Piff!
piff! piff!"--as some sudden dissension broke out, or some suspicious
cat, or other marauder, came near the nest tree. The crows, always bold
in the early morning hours, would come into the Balm o' Gileads after
birds' nests, sometimes, before we were astir. I remember that Addison
once cut my nap short by firing his gun from the chamber window at a
crow that was sneaking into the Balm o' Gileads after young robins. He
shot the crow, but my own ear rang for more than two hours, and I was so
confused for a time, that I scarcely knew enough to dress myself.

There is no combination of letters which more nearly represents the song
notes of the robin than the above, I think, although many attempts have