The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars by A. D. (Augustine David) Crake
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page 20 of 339 (05%)
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Abroad he spread a cloak of red, A cloak of scarlet fine and gay, Again and again, he frisked over the plain, And merrily chanted a roundelay. The ballad went on to tell how next day Robin saw this fine bird, whose name was Allan-a-dale, with his feathers all moultered; because his bonnie love had been snatched from him and was about to be wed to a wizened old knight, at a neighbouring church, against her will. And then how Robin Hood and Little John, and twenty-four of their merrie men, stopped the ceremony, and Little John, assuming the Bishop's robe, married the fair bride to Allan-a-dale, who thereupon became their man and took to an outlaw's life with his bonny wife. "Well sung, my lad, but when thou shalt marry, I wish thee a better priest than Little John; here is a guerdon for thee, a rose noble; some day thou wilt be a famous minstrel. "And now, my Stephen, let us sleep, if our good hosts will permit." "There is a hut hard by, such as we all use, which I have devoted to your service; clean straw and thick coverlets of skins, warriors will hardly ask more." "It was but an hour since I thought the heath would have been our couch, and a snowball our pillow; we shall be well content." "It is wind proof, and thou mayst rest in safety till the horn |
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