“A boone, a boone, thou curtail fryer,
    I beg it on my knee;
  Give me leave to set my horn to my mouth
    And to blow blastes three.”

The friar consented contemptuously, for he had got the better of the fight; so Robin blew his “blastes three,” and presently fifty of his yeomen made their appearance.  It was now the friar’s turn to ask a favour.

  “A boone, a boone,” said the curtail fryer,
    “The like I gave to thee: 
  Give me leave to set my fist to my mouth
    And to whute whues three.”

and as Robin readily agreed to this, he sounded his “whues three,” and immediately—­

  Halfe a hundred good band-dogs
    Came running o’er the lee.

  “Here’s for every man a dog
    And I myself for thee.” 
  “Nay, by my faith,” said Robin Hood,
    “Fryer, that may not be.”

  Two dogs at once to Robin Hood did goe. 
    The one behinde, the other before;
  Robin Hood’s mantle of Lincoln greene
    Offe from his backe they tore.

  And whether his men shot east or west. 
    Or they shot north or south,
  The curtail dogs, so taught they were,
    They kept the arrows in their mouth.

  “Take up the dogs,” said Little John;
    “Fryer, at my bidding be.” 
  “Whose man art thou,” said the curtail fryer,
    “Come here to prate to me!”

  “I’m Little John, Robin Hood’s man. 
    Fryer, I will not lie. 
  If thou tak’st not up thy dogs,
    I’ll take them up for thee.”

  Little John had a bowe in his hands. 
    He shot with mighte and maine;
  Soon half a score of the fryer’s dogs
    Lay dead upon the plaine.

  “Hold thy hand, good fellow,” said the curtail fryer. 
    “Thy master and I will agree,
  And we will have new order ta’en
    With all the haste may be.”

Then Robin Hood said to the friar: 

  “If thou wilt forsake fair Fountains Dale
    And Fountains Abbey free,
  Every Sunday throughout the yeare
    A noble shall be thy fee.

  “And every holiday throughout the yeare
    Changed shall thy garment be
  If thou wilt go to fair Nottinghame
    And there remaine with me.”

  This curtail fryer had kept Fountains Dale
    Seven long years and more;
  There was neither knight, lord or earle
    Could make him yield before.

According to tradition, the friar accepted Robin’s offer and became the famous Friar Tuck of the outlaw’s company of Merrie Men whom in Ivanhoe Scott describes as exchanging blows in a trial of strength with Richard Coeur de Lion.  It was said that when Robin Hood died, his bow and arrows were hung up in Fountains Abbey, where they remained for centuries.