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Updated: May 6, 2025
On its steep sides the native forest still flourished, and seated at the foot of a tall maple, tented in by a heavy low growth at my back, I could look across the narrow chasm through a gap in the trees, and see the redstart nest in the pasture beyond.
Watching the line of the hedge, about every two minutes, either near at hand or yonder a bird darts out just at the level of the grass, hovers a second with labouring wings, and returns as swiftly to the cover. Sometimes it is a flycatcher, sometimes a greenfinch, or chaffinch, now and then a robin, in one place a shrike, perhaps another is a redstart.
I have never seen the Black Redstart about the high part of the Island amongst the rocks, which I am rather surprised at, as in the south coast of Devon it seems particularly partial to high cliffs and rocks, such as the Parson and Clerk Rock near Teignmouth; but in Guernsey the wild grassy commons, with scattered rocks and large boulders, and occasionally a rough pebbly beach, especially the upper part of it where the pebbles join the grass, seem more the favourite resort of this bird than the high rocks, such places probably being more productive of food.
In the spring he sings, in the summer he sings, and he continues when the last sheaves are being carried from the wheat field. The redstart yonder has given forth a few notes, the whitethroat flings himself into the air at short intervals and chatters, the shrike calls sharp and determined, faint but shrill calls descend from the swifts in the air.
In going from a district of the Old Red Sandstone to where I walk upon the old Plutonic Rock, not fifty miles distant, I miss in the woods, the veery, the hermit thrush, the chestnut-sided warbler, the blue-backed warbler, the green-backed warbler, the black and yellow warbler, and many others, and find in their stead the wood thrush, the chewink, the redstart, the yellow-throat, the yellow-breasted flycatcher, the white-eyed flycatcher, the quail, and the turtle dove.
How early in life young birds are taught some of the lessons that are needful for their own safety! One day I heard a young redstart chirping for his dinner. I quietly thrust my head into the thicket, and soon espied the birdkin perched on a twig only about a rod away. He either did not see me, or else decided that I was not a bugaboo.
I looked behind; there was no place for a bird to sing. I remembered the redstart, how he calls sometimes from among the rocks, and refuses to show himself, and runs and hides when you look for him. I searched the wall; but not a bird track marked the snow. All the while the wonderful carol went on, now in the air, now close beside me, growing more and more bewildering as I listened.
Here they often spent a Saturday afternoon, reading, or making rush baskets, or wreaths of flowers, and listening to the sweet singing of the redstart, whose nest was in the top of the oak. Very sweet and plaintive was the music of the redstart. When the season for hop gathering came, the children had a grand frolic, as this kind of labor, in which they took a part, was a real pleasure to them.
Watching the line of the hedge, about every two minutes, either near at hand or yonder a bird darts out just at the level of the grass, hovers a second with labouring wings, and returns as swiftly to the cover. Sometimes it is a flycatcher, sometimes a greenfinch, or chaffinch, now and then a robin, in one place a shrike, perhaps another is a redstart.
As I drew near an old moss-covered apple-tree, I heard a low though energetic "phit! phit!" and a chipping sparrow emerged from the tree with much haste, quickly followed by a redstart, with the unmistakable air of proprietor. The sight of me made a diversion.
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