‘Now give me moud,’ Robin said to Little John,
‘Now give me moud with thy hand;
I trust to God in heaven so high
My housel will me bestand.’
And he refuses to let Little John burn the house of the treacherous Prioress where he had come by his death. This is heroic poetry in its simplest form, and quite true to its proper nature.
The beauty of the ballads is uncertain and often corrupted by forgetfulness and the ordinary accidents of popular tradition. It is not always true that the right subject has the best form. But the grace of the ballads is unmistakable; it is unlike anything in the contemporary romances, because it is lyrical poetry. It is often vague and intangible. It is never the same as narrative romance.
He’s tane three locks o’ her yellow hair,
Binnorie, O Binnorie!
And wi’ them strung his harp so fair
By the bonny mill-dams o’ Binnorie.