"Here, what's the game? None of your dirty tricks on me, now!"
"You sing loudly," said Robin, "so I'll make a nigger minstrel of you. Hold him tight, my Merry Men!"
Thereupon he rubbed upon Osbody's neck and face the whole handful of bonfire ash, smelling pungently as it did of mingled wood and acid.
Osbody yelled furiously at first, but was compelled to close his mouth to prevent his tongue being coated with the ash. Very soon his grey eyes shone comically out of a coal-black face, and the ludicrous sight he presented made the Merry Men laugh so much that they were in some danger of releasing their captives.
"You filthy brutes, you shall suffer for this," Osbody howled, with difficulty suppressing tears of mortification.
"YOU FILTHY BRUTES, YOU SHALL SUFFER FOR THIS"
"Why, knave, what ailest thee? Art thou not being adorned by the lovely chemical dye which thee and thy henchmen made? I have changed thy mealy countenance into a glossy black one, and yet thou slingest abuse at me. A plague on thee for thy ingratitude!"
"He looks just like a shoe-polish advertisement!" gurgled Will Scarlet, between his paroxysms of mirth.