"'Hail, Merry Men, ye Merry Men, ye Merry Men,
Who only rob the rich that they may help the poor,
Whose oaken cudgels crack the crowns of knaves,
Crowns of knaves, crowns of knaves!'"
"That's O.K., Robin," said Little John, in honest admiration. "But why shouldn't it be 'crowns of Squirms'? They're the enemy, aren't they?"
"Nay, my valiant John, dost want our first concert to break up in a brawl? Admission will be free to esquires and friars, villains and knaves alike. With their usual cheek, some of the Squirms will wriggle into the front seats. Sing 'crack the crowns of Squirms' and you'll have 'em at our throats in a jiffy."
"We can look jolly hard at them as we sing it, though," said Will Scarlet, "so they will know we mean them by 'knaves'."
"Oh, rather!" agreed Robin. "Your deadly foes will get some sound raps ere the concert is finished, I promise ye, my Merry Men. But never must we give them cause to raid the platform. There'll be prefects present, and perhaps a master or two!"
Being too wise to weary them by endless repetition, Robin dropped the chorus there and then, and passed to the next item on the programme, which was a song by "Allan a Dale", otherwise Frank Locke, the only Merry Man who sang solos as a choirboy, though always painfully shy about using his clear voice.
With nervous fingers he rustled the pages of the ditty which Robin handed to him.
"Really, Robin, you ought to sing this yourself," he pleaded. "It's mostly about you."
"Nay, Allan, wouldst have the populace say that Robin Hood loved nothing better than the blowing of his own horn?"
"I'm all of a shiver," declared Allan a Dale.