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Maid Marian-Part6_Thomas Love Peacock(1785-1866)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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They rode on several miles in silence, till they discovered

the towers and spires of Nottingham, where the knight introduced



himself to the sheriff, and demanded an armed force to assist in

the apprehension of the outlawed Earl of Huntingdon. The sheriff,



who was willing to have his share of the prize, determined to accompany

the knight in person, and regaled him and his man with good store



of the best; after which, they, with a stout retinue of fifty men,

took the way to Gamwell feast.



"God's my life," said the sheriff, as they rode along,

"I had as lief you would tell me of a service of plate.



I much doubt if this outlawed earl, this forester Robin,

be not the man they call Robin Hood, who has quartered



himself in Sherwood Forest, and whom in endeavouring

to apprehend I have fallen divers times into disasters.



He has gotten together a band of disinherited prodigals,

outlawed debtors, excommunicated heretics, elder sons that



have spent all they had, and younger sons that never had any

thing to spend; and with these he kills the king's deer,



and plunders wealthy travellers of five-sixths of their money;

but if they be abbots or bishops, them he despoils utterly."



The sheriff then proceeded to relate to his companion the adventure

of the abbot of Doubleflask (which some grave historians have



related of the abbot of Saint Mary's, and others of the bishop

of Hereford): how the abbot, returning to his abbey in company



with his high selerer, who carried in his portmanteau the rents

of the abbey-lands, and with a numerous train of attendants,



came upon four seeming peasants, who were roasting the king's

venison by the king's highway: how, in just indignation at



this flagrant infringement of the forest laws, he asked them

what they meant, and they answered that they meant to dine:



how he ordered them to be seized and bound, and led captive

to Nottingham, that they might know wild-flesh to have been destined



by Providence for licensed and privileged appetites, and not for

the base hunger of unqualified knaves: how they prayed for mercy,



and how the abbot swore by Saint Charity that he would show them none:

how one of them thereupon drew a bugle horn from under his



smock-frock and blew three blasts, on which the abbot and his

train were instantly surrounded by sixty bowmen in green:



how they tied him to a tree, and made him say mass for their sins:

how they unbound him, and sate him down with them to dinner,



and gave him venison and wild-fowl and wine, and made him pay

for his fare all the money in his high selerer's portmanteau,



and enforced him to sleep all night under a tree in his cloak,

and to leave the cloak behind him in the morning: how the abbot,



light in pocket and heavy in heart, raised the country upon

Robin Hood, for so he had heard the chief forester called



by his men, and hunted him into an old woman's cottage:

how Robin changed dresses with the old woman, and how the abbot rode



in great triumph to Nottingham, having in custody an old woman in a

green doublet and breeches: how the old woman discovered herself:



how the merrymen of Nottingham laughed at the abbot:

how the abbot railed at the old woman, and how the old woman



out-railed the abbot, telling him that Robin had given her food

and fire through the winter, which no abbot would ever do,



but would rather take it from her for what he called the good

of the church, by which he meant his own laziness and gluttony;



and that she knew a true man from a false thief, and a free

forester from a greedy abbot.



"Thus you see," added the sheriff, "how this villain perverts

the deluded people by making them believe that those who tithe



and toll upon them for their spiritual and temporal benefit are not

their best friends and fatherly guardians; for he holds that in



giving to boors and old women what he takes from priests and peers,

he does but restore to the former what the latter had taken from them;



and this the impudent varlet calls distributive justice.

Judge now if any loyal subject can be safe in such neighbourhood."



While the sheriff was thus enlightening his companion concerning

the offenders, and whetting his own indignation against them,



the sun was fast sinking to the west. They rode on till they

came in view of a bridge, which they saw a party approaching



from the opposite side, and the knightpresently discovered




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