The company that waited for the Sheriff were all amazed to see him come
out of the forest bearing a heavy sack upon his shoulders; but though
they questioned him, he answered never a word, acting like one who walks
in a dream. Without a word, he placed the bag across his nag's back and
then, mounting, rode away, all following him; but all the time there
was a great turmoil of thoughts within his head, tumbling one over the
other. And thus ends the merry tale of Little John and how he entered
the Sheriff's service.




Little John and the Tanner of Blyth

ONE FINE DAY, not long after Little John had left abiding with the
Sheriff and had come back, with his worship's cook, to the merry
greenwood, as has just been told, Robin Hood and a few chosen fellows of
his band lay upon the soft sward beneath the greenwood tree where they
dwelled. The day was warm and sultry, so that while most of the band
were scattered through the forest upon this mission and upon that, these
few stout fellows lay lazily beneath the shade of the tree, in the soft
afternoon, passing jests among themselves and telling merry stories,
with laughter and mirth.

All the air was laden with the bitter fragrance of the May, and all
the bosky shades of the woodlands beyond rang with the sweet song of
birds--the throstle cock, the cuckoo, and the wood pigeon--and with the
song of birds mingled the cool sound of the gurgling brook that leaped
out of the forest shades, and ran fretting amid its rough, gray stones
across the sunlit open glade before the trysting tree. And a fair sight