Definitions

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  • noun Plural form of redbreast.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Bidding her note every appearance, animal and vegetable, that showed the approach of spring, and communicate them to him, he said, On the 27th of February I saw blackbirds and robin redbreasts; and on the 7th of this month I heard the frogs for the first time this year.

    The Bloom of Monticello 1926

  • The waistcoat was indispensable, and the slang name for them was "redbreasts," in consequence.

    The Letters of Charles Dickens Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 Charles Dickens 1841

  • It had formerly been her delight, so she affirmed, to hear the loups-degorge (rouges-gorges) chanter dans les ogrepines (aubepines) — to hear the redbreasts sing in the hawthorn-trees.

    Les Miserables 2008

  • ‘That ‘ere Tony is the blessedest boy,’ said Mr. Weller, heedless of this rebuff, ‘the blessedest boy as ever I see in MY days! of all the charmin’est infants as ever I heerd tell on, includin’ them as was kivered over by the robin-redbreasts arter they’d committed sooicide with blackberries, there never wos any like that ‘ere little Tony.

    Master Humphrey's Clock 2007

  • ‘That ‘ere Tony is the blessedest boy,’ said Mr. Weller, heedless of this rebuff, ‘the blessedest boy as ever I see in MY days! of all the charmin’est infants as ever I heerd tell on, includin’ them as was kivered over by the robin-redbreasts arter they’d committed sooicide with blackberries, there never wos any like that ‘ere little Tony.

    Master Humphrey's Clock 2007

  • London and summer are many months away: our moors are all white with snow just now, and little redbreasts come every morning to the window for crumbs.

    The Life of Charlotte Bronte 2002

  • Olivia and Sophia would, I am quite sure, never have spread the dinner-cloth upon hay, which would most surely have set all the gravy aflow, if the platters had not been fairly overturned; and as for the redbreasts, (with that rollicking boy Moses in my mind,) I think they must have been terribly tame birds.

    The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 79, May, 1864 Various

  • "Well, I have heard in my time a great many wonderful stories of robin-redbreasts and jenny-wrens, but I always understood that they were intended only to amuse little boys and girls."

    Willis the Pilot Paul Adrien

  • In the autumn, when the leaves, dressed in their gayest dress, were bidding farewell to the sunshine and the wind and each other, hundreds of robin-redbreasts -- "God's birds" -- hopped like little flames about the ground, and in a hollow tree near the cottage door a pretty red-brown wren and his mate had found shelter for a long time, and reared several broods.

    Harper's Young People, February 17, 1880 An Illustrated Weekly Various

  • There were blackbirds with yellow bills, who advanced boldly over the snow up to the very feet of the distributing fairy; robin redbreasts, nearly as tame, hopping gayly over the stones, bobbing their heads and puffing out their red breasts; and tomtits, prudently watching awhile from the tops of neighboring trees, then suddenly taking flight, and with quick, sharp cries, seizing the grain on the wing.

    The French Immortals Series — Complete Various

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