Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1871-04-05


sleeves and deep cape; it is made of blacl
cashmere, embroidered with white ant
trimmed with black and white fringe
Short jackets of gray cloth are very prett.
for spring wear these are made with
nsouSguetalre cuffs and large side pockets
or bordered with bias silk of the same hu
and edged with corded fringe.
The Robin.
The return of the robin is commonly an
nounced by the newspapers, ike that o
notorious people to watering place, a:
the first authentic notification of spring
And such his appearance in the orchard and
garden undoubtedly is. But, in spite OF
his name of migratory thrush, he stays
with us all winter, and l have seen him
when the thermometer marked fifteen de-
4 grees below zero Of Fahrenheit, armed i'm
pregnably within like Emerson's titmOuse,
and as cheerful as he. The robin has a
bad reputation among people who do not
value themselves less for being fond OF
cherries There is, | admit, a vulgarity
in him and his song Is rather of the Bloom
field sort, too largely ballasted with prose.
His ethics are Of the Poor Richard school,
and the main chance which calls forth all
his energy is altogether Of the belly. lie
never has those fine intervals of lunacy
into which his cousins, the catbird and the
marvis are apt to fall. But for a that
and twice as muckle's a that, | would not
exchange him for all the cherries that ever
came from Asia Minor With whatever
faults, he has not wholly forfeited that
superiority which belongs to the children
of nature He has a finer taste in fruit
than could be distilled from many sue
cessive committees of the horticultural So
ciety. and eats with u relshing gulp not
inferior to DR.. ,Johnsou's He feels and
freely exercises his right OF eminent do
main. His is the earliest mess OF green
pea, his all the mulberries l had tancIed
mine But if he got the lions share Of
raspberries, he IS great planter, and sows
those wild ones in the woods, that solace
the pedestrian and give a momentary
calm even to the jaded victims OF the
White hills. lie keeps a strict eye over
ones fruit, and knows to a shade OF pur-
pie when your grapes have cooked enough
IN the sun. During the severe drouth a
few years ago the robins wholly vanished
from my garden 1 neither saw nor heard
one for three weeks Meanwhile small
foreign grapevine, rather shy Of bearing
seemed 10 tiud the dusty air congenial, and
dreaming perhaps of sweet Agros across
the sea. decked itself with 4 score or 30 Of
fair bunch6s. | watched them from day
to day till they should have secreted sugar
enough from the sunbeams, and at last
made up my mind that l would celebrate
my vintage the next morning. But the
robins, too. had somehow kept note of them.
They must have sent spies, as did the Jews
into the promised land. before | was stir
ring When | went with my basket, at
lcasr q dozen OF these winged vintagers
hustled out from among the leaves, and
aGchtinr on the nearest tree interchanged
some shrill remarks about me Of deroga-
tory nature. They had fairly sacked the
vine Not WelIington'S veterans made a
cleaner work OF Spanish town not fed
erals were ever more impartial in the con-
fscatiCn of neutral chickens. l was keep
ing my grapes a secret TO surprise taIr
FIdele with, but the robins made them a
protouuder secret 10 her than l had meant.
The tattered remnant of a single bunch
was an my haryest-home. How 1t looked
at the bottom Of my basket-as if hum
ming-bird had laid her eggs in an eagles
nest, | could not help laughing, and the
robins seemed to Join heartily in the mer-
rimeut There was native grapevine
close by, blue with its less refined abun-
dance, but my cunning thieves preferred
the foreign flavor. Could l tax them for
want of taste
The robins are good solo sing but
their chorus, as, like primitive fre-wor-
slippers, they hail the return Of life and
warmth, 10 the world IS unrivaled. There
are a hundred singing like one. They are
noisy enough then, and sing as poets should,
with no after-thought But when they
come after cherries to the tree near my
window, they mutfle their voices, and their
faint pip, pip, pop sounds far away at the
bottom of the garden, where they know l
shall not suspect them Of robbing the great
black walnut of its bitter-rinded store
They are feathered picksniffs, TO be sure,
but then how brightly their breasts, thai
look rather shabby in the sunlight, shine
in a rainy day against the dark green
Of the fringetree After they have pinchec
and shaken all the lie out Of an earth
worm, as Italian cooks pound all the spirit
out Of steak and then gulped him, they
7 stand up in honest self defiance, expand
their red waistcoats with the virtuous all
of a lobby member, and OUTAGE with an
eye that calmly challenges inquiry, Dc
[ look ike bird that knows the quality
of raw vermin ? | throw myself upon a
jury Of my peers. Ask a robin if he ever
ate anything less aseetic than the frugal
berry Of juniper, and he will answer that
his VOW forbds him. Can such an open
bosom cover such depravity? Alas, yes
| have no doubt his breast was redder at
that very moment with the blood Of my
raspberries On the whole he is a doubt
ful friend in the garden. He makes his
dessert of all kind OF berries, and is not
averse to early pears. But when We
remember how omniyorous he Is, eating his
own weight in an incredibly short time, and
that nature seems exhaustless in her in
vention of new insects hostile to vcgeta-
tion perhaps we may reckon that he does
more good than harm. For my own part,
/ would rather have his cheerfulness and
kind neighborhood than many berries
James Russell LosceH
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