ACT I.-SCENE I., THE BOND; SCENES II., III., THE OUTLAWRY.

ACT I.

SCENE I-THE GARDEN BEFORE SIR RICHARD LEA'S CASTLE.

Kate (gathering flowers). These roses for my Lady Marian; these lilies to lighten Sir Richard's black room, where he sits and eats his heart for want of money to pay the Abbot.

The warrior Earl of Allendale, He loved the Lady Anne; The lady loved the master well, The maid she loved the man.

All in the castle garden,

Or ever the day began,

The lady gave a rose to the Earl, The maid a rose to the man.

'I go to fight in Scotland

[Sings.

With many a savage clan;'
The lady gave her hand to the Earl,
The maid her hand to the man.

'Farewell, farewell, my warrior Earl!'
And ever a tear down ran.
She gave a weeping kiss to the Earl,
And the maid a kiss to the man.

Enter four ragged RETAINERS.

First Retainer. You do well, Mistress Kate, to sing and to gather roses. You be fed with tit-bits, you, and we be dogs that have only the bones, till we be only bones our own selves.

Second Retainer. I am fed with titbits no more than you are, but I keep a good heart and make the most of it, and, truth to say, Sir Richard and my Lady Marian fare wellnigh as sparely as their people.

Third Retainer.

And look at our suits, out at knee, out at elbow. We be more like scarecrows in a field than decent serving men; and then, I pray you, look at Robin Earl of Huntingdon's

be in their liveries, and each of 'em s full of meat as an egg, and as sleek a as round-about as a mellow codlin.

Fourth Retainer. But I be worse than any of you, for I be lean by natu and if you cram me crop full I be litt better than Famine in the picture, but you starve me I be Gaffer Death himse I would like to show you, Mistress Kats how bare and spare I be on the rib: 1 lanker than an old horse turned out die on the common.

Kate. Spare me thy spare ribs, I pat thee; but now I ask you all, did note you love young Walter Lea?

First Retainer. Ay, if he had gone to fight the king's battles, we sho have better battels at home.

Kate. Right as an Oxford scholar, b the boy was taken prisoner by the Moors First Retainer. Ay.

Kate. And Sir Richard was told b might be ransomed for two thousan marks in gold.

First Retainer. Ay.

Kate.

Then he borrowed the mons from the Abbot of York, the Sherif brother. And if they be not paid back at the end of the year, the land goes the Abbot.

First Retainer. No news of young Walter?

Kate. None, nor of the gold, nor the man who took out the gold: but now know why we live so stintedly, and wis ye have so few grains to peck at. Richard must scrape and scrape til get to the land again. Come, come, w do you loiter here? Carry fresh rusts into the dining-hall, for those that there they be so greasy and smell so vile that my Lady Marian holds her nose whet she steps across it.

Fourth Retainer. Why there, DO that very word 'greasy' hath a kind unction in it, a smack of relish about 2 The rats have gnawed 'em already. pray Heaven we may not have to take to [Excus

the rushes.

Kate. Poor fellows!

The lady gave her hand to the Earl, The maid her hand to the man.

Enter LITTLE JOHN.

Little John. My master, Robin the Earl, is always a-telling us that every man, for the sake of the great blessed Mother in heaven, and for the love of his own little mother on earth, should handle all womankind gently, and hold them in all honour, and speak small to 'em, and not scare 'em, but go about to come at their love with all manner of homages, and observances, and circumbendibuses.

Kate.

The lady gave a rose to the Earl,
The maid a rose to the man.

Little John (seeing her). O the sacred little thing! What a shape! what lovely arms! A rose to the man! Ay, the man had given her a rose and she gave him another.

Kate. Shall I keep one little rose for Little John? No.

Little John. There, there! You see I was right. She hath a tenderness toward me, but is too shy to show it. It is in her, in the woman, and the man must bring it out of her.

Kate. Dream of it, then, all the way back, for now I will have none of it.

Little John. Nay, now thou hast given me the man's kiss, let me give thee the maid's.

Kate. If thou draw one inch nearer, I will give thee a buffet on the face.

Little John. Wilt thou not give me rather the little rose for Little John? Kate (throws it down and tramples on it). There!

[Kate seeing Marian exit hurriedly. Enter MARIAN (singing).

Love flew in at the window,

As Wealth walk'd in at the door.

"You have come for you saw Wealth coming,' said I.

But he flutter'd his wings with a sweet little cry, I'll cleave to you rich or poor.

Wealth dropt out of the window,

Poverty crept thro' the door.

'Well now you would fain follow Wealth,' said I, But he flutter'd his wings as he gave me the lie, I cling to you all the more.

Little John. Thanks, my lady—inasmuch as I am a true believer in true love myself, and your Ladyship hath sung the old proverb out of fashion.

Marian. Ay but thou hast ruffled my woman, Little John. She hath the fire in her face and the dew in her eyes. I believed thee to be too solemn and formal to be a ruffler. Out upon thee!

Little John. I am no ruffler, my lady; but I pray you, my lady, if a man and a maid love one another, may the maid give the first kiss?

Marian. It will be all the more gracious of her if she do.

Little John. I cannot tell. Manners be so corrupt, and these are the days of Prince John. [Exit. Enter SIR RICHARD LEA (reading a bond).

will come home at last.

Sir Richard. I trust he will, but if he do not I and thou are but beggars. Marian. We will be beggar'd then

and be true to the King.

Sir Richard. Thou speakest like a fool or a woman. Canst thou endure to be a beggar whose whole life hath been folded like a blossom in the sheath, like a careless sleeper in the down; who never hast felt a want, to whom all things, up to this present, have come as freely as heaven's air and mother's milk?

Marian. Tut, father! I am none of your delicate Norman maidens who can only broider and mayhap ride a-hawking with the help of the men. I can bake and I can brew, and by all the saints I can shoot almost as closely with the bow as the great Earl himself. I have played at the foils too with Kate: but is not to-day his birthday?

Sir Richard. Dost thou love him indeed, that thou keepest a record of his birthdays? Thou knowest that the Sheriff of Nottingham loves thee.

Marian. The Sheriff dare to love me? me who worship Robin the great Earl of Huntingdon? I love him as a damsel of his day might have loved Harold the Saxon, or Hereward the Wake. They both fought against the tyranny of the kings, the Normans. But then your Sheriff, your little man, if he dare to fight at all, would fight for his rents, his leases, his houses, his monies, his oxen, his dinners, himself. Now your great man, your Robin, all England's Robin, fights not for himself but for the people of England. This John-this Norman tyranny-the stream is bearing us all down, and our little Sheriff will ever swim with the

Sir Richard.

There-there-be n a fool again. Their aim is ever at that which flies highest-but O girl, girl, I am almost in despair. Those two thousan marks lent me by the Abbot for the r som of my son Walter-I believed t Abbot of the party of King Richard, a. he hath sold himself to that beast Je -they must be paid in a year and month, or I lose the land. There is one that should be grateful to me overseas a Count in Brittany-he lives nea Quimper. I saved his life once in battle He has monies. I will go to him. I saved him. I will try him. I am but sure of him. will go to him.

Marian. And I will follow thee, and God help us both.

Sir Richard. Child, thou shocks marry one who will pay the mortg This Robin, this Earl of Huntingdonis a friend of Richard-I know not, but may save the land, he may save the lin

Marian (showing a cross hung rend her neck). Father, you see this cross? Sir Richard. Ay the King, thy g father, gave it thee when a baby.

Marian. And he said that whenever I married he would give me away, an on this cross I have sworn [kisses it) that till I myself pass away, there is no othe man that shall give me away.

Sir Richard. Lo there-thou art fool

gain-I am all as loyal as thyself, but what a vow! what a vow!

Re-enter LITTLE JOHN.

Little John. My Lady Marian, your voman so flustered me that I forgot my nessage from the Earl. To-day he hath Accomplished his thirtieth birthday, and e prays your ladyship and your ladyship's ather to be present at his banquet to-night. Marian. Say, we will come.

Little John. And I pray you, my lady, o stand between me and your woman, Kate.

Marian. I will speak with her.

Little John. I thank you, my lady, ind I wish you and your ladyship's father a nost exceedingly good morning. [Exit.

Sir Richard. Thou hast answered for ne, but I know not if I will let thee go. Marian. I mean to go.

Sir Richard. Not if I barred thee up in thy chamber, like a bird in a cage. Marian. Then I would drop from the casement, like a spider.

Sir Richard. But I would hoist the drawbridge, like thy master.

Marian. And I would swim the moat, ike an otter.

Sir Richard. But I would set my men-at-arms to oppose thee, like the Lord of the Castle.

Marian. And I would break through them all, like the King of England.

Sir Richard. Well, thou shalt go, but O the land! the land! my great great great grandfather, my great great grandfather, my great grandfather, my grandFather and my own father-they were born and bred on it-it was their mother -they have trodden it for half a thousand years, and whenever I set my own foot on it I say to it, Thou art mine, and it answers, I am thine to the very heart of the earth-but now I have lost my gold, I have lost my son, and I shall lose my land also. Down to the devil with this bond that beggars me!

[Flings down the bond.

Marian. Take it again, dear father, be not wroth at the dumb parchment. Sufficient for the day, dear father! let us be merry to-night at the banquet.

Sheriff. If so

[Shouts, 'Down with John!' Prince John. You hear!

Sheriff. Yes, my lord, fear not. I will answer for you.

Enter LITTLE JOHN, SCARLET, MUCH, &c., from the banquet singing a snatch of the Drinking Song.

Little John. I am a silent man myself, and all the more wonder at our Earl. What a wealth of words-O Lord, I will live and die for King Richard-not so much for the cause as for the Earl. Lord, I am easily led by words, but I

O

think the Earl hath right. Scarlet, hath not the Earl right? What makes thee so down in the mouth?

Scarlet. I doubt not, I doubt not, and though I be down in the mouth, I will swear by the head of the Earl.

Little John. Thou Much, miller's son, hath not the Earl right?

Much. More water goes by the mill than the miller wots of, and more goes to make right than I know of, but for all that I will swear the Earl hath right. But they are coming hither for the dance

(Enter FRIAR TUCK.)

be they not, Friar Tuck? Thou art the Earl's confessor and shouldst know.

Tuck. Ay, ay, and but that I am a man of weight, and the weight of the church to boot on my shoulders, I would dance too. Fa, la, la, fa, la, la.

[Capering. Much. But doth not the weight of the flesh at odd times overbalance the weight of the church, ha friar?

Tuck. Homo sum. I love my dinner -but I can fast, I can fast; and as,to other frailties of the flesh-out upon thee! Homo sum, sed virgo sum, I am a virgin, my masters, I am a virgin.

Much. And a virgin, my masters, three yards about the waist is like to remain a virgin, for who could embrace such an armful of joy?

Tuck. Knave, there is a lot of wild fellows in Sherwood Forest who hold by King Richard. If ever I meet thee there, I will break thy sconce with my quarterstaff.

Enter from the banqueting-hall SIR RICHARD LEA, ROBIN HOOD, &c. Robin. My guests and friends, Sir Richard, all of you

Who deign to honour this my thirtieth year,

And some of you were prophets that I