Ernest Seton Thompson,
Bird-Lore: Volume I No. 2 — For Young Observers…
(1899)
“ And then a final handful threw that stuck upon his breast. The Brook-bird′s mother did her best to wash the stains away. But there they stuck, and, as it seems, are very like to stay. And so he wears the splashes and the mud blotch as you see. ”

