as fair, tall sons beside her as one could find in all Nottinghamshire, but that they were now taken from her, and were like to be hanged straightway; that, want having come upon them, her eldest boy had gone out, the night before, into the forest, and had slain a hind in the moonlight; that the King’s rangers had followed the blood upon the grass until they had come to her cottage, and had there found the deer’s meat in the cupboard; that, as neither of the younger sons would betray their brother, the foresters had taken all three away, in spite of the oldest saying that he alone had slain the deer; that, as they went, she had heard the rangers talking among themselves, saying that the Sheriff had sworn that he would put a check upon the great slaughter of deer that had been going on of late by hanging the very first rogue caught thereat upon the nearest tree, and that they would take the three youths to the King’s Head Inn, near Nottingham Town, where the Sheriff was abiding that day, there to await the return of a certain fellow he had sent into Sherwood to seek for Robin Hood.

To all this Little John listened, shaking his head sadly now and then.  “Alas,” quoth he, when the good dame had finished her speech, “this is indeed an ill case.  But who is this that goeth into Sherwood after Robin Hood, and why doth he go to seek him?  But no matter for that now; only that I would that Robin Hood were here to advise us.  Nevertheless, no time may be lost in sending for him at this hour, if we would save the lives of thy three sons.  Tell me, hast thou any clothes hereabouts that I may put on in place of these of Lincoln green?  Marry, if our stout Sheriff catcheth me without disguise, I am like to be run up more quickly than thy sons, let me tell thee, dame.”

Then the old woman told him that she had in the house some of the clothes of her good husband, who had died only two years before.  These she brought to Little John, who, doffing his garb of Lincoln green, put them on in its stead.  Then, making a wig and false beard of uncarded wool, he covered his own brown hair and beard, and, putting on a great, tall hat that had belonged to the old peasant, he took his staff in one hand and his bow in the other, and set forth with all speed to where the Sheriff had taken up his inn.

A mile or more from Nottingham Town, and not far from the southern borders of Sherwood Forest, stood the cosy inn bearing the sign of the King’s Head.  Here was a great bustle and stir on this bright morning, for the Sheriff and a score of his men had come to stop there and await Guy of Gisbourne’s return from the forest.  Great hiss and fuss of cooking was going on in the kitchen, and great rapping and tapping of wine kegs and beer barrels was going on in the cellar.  The Sheriff sat within, feasting merrily of the best the place afforded, and the Sheriff’s men sat upon the bench before the door, quaffing ale, or lay beneath the shade of the broad-spreading oak