Blair Collection > Gaelic names of beasts (mammalia), birds, fishes, insects, reptiles, etc

330 ROBIN— ROOK
the very prosaic name of the "painter's ghost," as it is much in
evidence when painters cannot work from the inclemency of the
weather. In Brittany, a fitter sense of things exist, the legend
going that the robin was once a mere sparrow, but it tried to
pluck a thorn from the crown placed on our Saviour's brow, and
in doing so got her breast dyed with blood ; it is the male alone
which has the red breast. Tennyson's natural history seems at
fault when he says, " in the spring a fuller crixnson comes upon
the robin's breast " ; the spring is the very time the robin's breast
is least red, it is then buff".
As an augury of coming storm, the following lines may be
([uoted as having proved perfectly true : —
A Rabairt leis a broilleach dhearg Robert with the ruddy breast
Cha d' thainig thus' an diugh le In anger thou coraest not to-day,
fearg. But to let us know of wintry blasts
Ach' dh 'innseadh gum bheil doinnion With blood of Macintoshes on snow
'teachd down-pressed.
Le full nan Toiseach air an t-sneachd.
When robins sing cheerfully on summer evenings, it is a sure
sign of fine weather ; it may be quite unsettled looking and
even raining when heard, it is sure to clear up in the night,
and be fine next day. On the other hand, when it is going to be
wet weather, robin will be found in a hedge or bush chirping in
a melancholy way, or possibly not chirping at all, but looking
miserable, and that even though the weather is not yet wet or
perhaps threatening. So sacred is this bird held that a decoction
of the very bark of a rose-brier in which a robin's nest is, is said
to be a cure for some ailments.
ROLLER. — Cuairsgean,
The garrulous one.
This is a rare bird both in Highlands and Lowlands. It has
been seen, and shot, near Inverness, and also Dunkeld.
ROOK (see also Crow). — Cnaimh-fhiach or fhitheach, creum-
hach ; Rocas, rocuis, rocus. Irish, preachan.
Carnell, era, craw ; Fleak, flick ; White-neb (old).
The etymology is from " hroc " (A. S.), Croaker or Norse
''hrokr," rocas, from "roc," hoarse.
Cho garbh ri rocas, As rough as a rook, seems the only proverb
procurable. As to rooks being always black, the following is some of
the latest evidence to disprove the assertion. A writer in the Edin-
burgh Evenhig Dispatch of June 1903 says that he shot a pure irhite
rook at Bahnuto, Fife, on the 2nd of that month, while next day
another writer testifies to having shot two white ones in the spring
of 1898, they being nearly full-grown and of a creamy white colour,