"So long as I'm able to handle my staff
To die in your debt, friend, I scorn:"
Then to it each goes, and follow'd their blows,
As if they had been threshing of corn.
The stranger gave Robin a crack on the crown,65
Which caused the blood to appear;
Then Robin enrag'd, more fiercely engag'd,
And follow'd his blows more severe.
So thick and so fast did he lay it on him,
With a passionate fury and ire,70
At every stroke he made him to smoke,
As if he had been all on fire.
O then into fury the stranger he grew,
And gave him a damnable look,
And with it a blow that laid him full low,75
And tumbl'd him into the brook.
"I prithee, good fellow, O where art thou now?"
The stranger, in laughter, he cry'd.
Quoth bold Robin Hood, "Good faith, in the flood,
And floating along with the tide.80
"I needs must acknowledge thou art a brave soul;
With thee I'll no longer contend;
For needs must I say, thou hast got the day,
Our battel shall be at an end."
Then unto the bank he did presently wade,85
And pull'd himself out by a thorn;
Which done, at the last, he blow'd a loud blast
Straitway on his fine bugle-horn:
The eccho of which through the vallies did fly,
At which his stout bowmen appear'd,90
All cloathed in green, most gay to be seen,
So up to their master they steer'd.
"O what's the matter?" quoth William Stutely;
"Good master, you are wet to the skin."
"No matter," quoth he; "the lad which you see95
In fighting hath tumbl'd me in."
"He shall not go scot-free," the others reply'd;
So strait they were seizing him there,
To duck him likewise; but Robin Hood cries,
"He is a stout fellow, forbear.100