204.4 i.e. as ever a hip (berry of the wild rose) is of its stone.
Now hath the sherif sworne his othe,
And home he began to gone;
He was as full of grenë-wode
As ever was hepe of stone.
[ THE FOURTH FYTTE (205-280)]
Argument.—Robin Hood will not dine until he has ‘his pay,’ and he therefore sends Little John with Much and Scarlok to wait for an ‘unketh gest.’ They capture a monk of St. Mary Abbey, and Robin Hood makes him disgorge eight hundred pounds. The monk, we are told, was on his way to London to take proceedings against the knight.
In due course the knight, who was left at the end of the second fytte at the wrestling-match, arrives to pay his debt to Robin Hood; who, however, refuses to receive it, saying that Our Lady had discharged the loan already.
The admirable, naïvely-told episode of Our Lady’s method of repaying money lent on her security, is not without parallels, some of which Child points out (III. 53-4).