Classic Poem

Sherwood Forest: An open glade, showing on the right the mouth
of the outlaw's cave. It is about sunset. The giant figure of LITTLE
JOHN comes out of the cave, singing.

LITTLE JOHN

[Sings.]


When Spring comes back to England
And crowns her brows with may,
Round the merry moonlit world
She goes the greenwood way.

[He stops and calls in stentorian tones.]

Much! Much! Much! Where has he vanished now,
Where has that monstrous giant the miller's son
Hidden himself?

[Enter MUCH, a dwarf-like figure, carrying a large bundle of ferns.]

MUCH

Hush, hush, child, here I am!
And here's our fairy feather-beds, ha! ha!
Come, praise me, praise me, for a thoughtful parent.
There's nothing makes a better bed than ferns
Either for sleeping sound or rosy dreams.

LITTLE JOHN

Take care the fern-seed that the fairies use
Get not among thy yellow locks, my Titan,
Or thou'lt wake up invisible. There's none
Too much of Much already.

MUCH

[Looking up at him impudently.]

It would take
Our big barn full of fern-seed, I misdoubt,
To make thee walk invisible, Little John,
My sweet Tom Thumb! And, in this troublous age
Of forest-laws, if we night-walking minions,
We gentlemen of the moon, could only hunt
Invisible, there's many and many of us
With thumbs lopped off, eyes gutted and legs pruned,
Slick, like poor pollarded pear-trees, would be lying
Happy and whole this day beneath the boughs.

LITTLE JOHN

Invisible? Ay, but what would Jenny say
To such a ghostly midge as thou would'st be
Sipping invisibly at her cherry lips.

MUCH

Why, there now, that's a teaser. E'en as it is
(Don't joke about it) my poor Jenny takes
The smallness of her Much sorely to heart!
And though I often tell her half a loaf
(Ground in our mill) is better than no bread,
She weeps, poor thing, that an impartial heaven
Bestows on her so small a crumb of bliss
As me! You'd scarce believe, now, half the nostrums,
Possets and strangely nasty herbal juices
That girl has made me gulp, in the vain hope
That I, the frog, should swell to an ox like thee.
I tell her it's all in vain, and she still cheats
Her fancy and swears I've grown well nigh three feet
Already. O Lord, she's desperate. She'll advance
Right inward to the sources of creation,
She'll take the reins of the world in hand. She'll stop
The sun like Joshua, turn the moon to blood,
And if I have to swallow half the herbs
In Sherwood, I shall stalk a giant yet,
Shoulder to shoulder with thee, Little John,
And crack thy head at quarter-staff. But don't,
Don't joke about it. 'Tis a serious matter.

LITTLE JOHN

Into the cave, then, with thy feather-bed.
Old Much, thy father, waits thee there to make
A table of green turfs for Robin Hood.
We shall have guests anon, O merry times,
Baron and Knight and abbot, all that ride
Through Sherwood, all shall come and dine with him
When they have paid their toll! Old Much is there
Growling at thy delay.

MUCH

[Going towards the cave.]

O, my poor father.
Now, there's a sad thing, too. He is so ashamed
Of his descendants. Why for some nine years
He shut his eyes whenever he looked at me;
And I have seen him on the village green
Pretend to a stranger, once, who badgered him
With curious questions, that I was the son
Of poor old Gaffer Bramble, the lame sexton.
That self-same afternoon, up comes old Bramble
White hair a-blaze and big red waggling nose
All shaking with the palsy; bangs our door
Clean off its hinges with his crab-tree crutch,
And stands there--framed--against the sunset sky!
He stretches out one quivering fore-finger
At father, like the great Destroying Angel
In the stained window: straight, the milk boiled over,
The cat ran, baby squalled and mother screeched.
Old Bramble asks my father--what--what--what
He meant--he meant--he meant! You should have seen
My father's hopeless face! Lord, how he blushed,
Red as a beet-root! Lord, Lord, how he blushed!
'Tis a hard business when a parent looks
Askance upon his offspring.

[Exit into the cave.]

LITTLE JOHN

Skip, you chatterer!
Here comes our master.

[Enter ROBIN HOOD.]

Master, where hast thou been?
I feared some harm had come to thee. What's this?
This was a cloth-yard shaft that tore thy coat!

ROBIN

Oh, ay, they barked my shoulder, devil take them.
I got it on the borders of the wood.
St. Nicholas, my lad, they're on the watch.

LITTLE JOHN

What didst thou there? They're on the watch, i' faith!
A squirrel could not pass them. Why, my namesake
Prince John would sell his soul to get thy head,
And both his ears for Lady Marian;
And whether his ears or soul be worth the more,
I know not. When the first lark flittered up
To sing, at dawn, I woke; and thou wast gone.
What didst thou there?

ROBIN

Well, first I went to swim
In the deep pool below the mill.

LITTLE JOHN

I swam
Enough last night to last me many a day.
What then?

ROBIN

I could not wash away the thought
Of all you told me. If Prince John should dare!
That helpless girl! No, no, I will not think it.
Why, Little John, I went and tried to shoot
A grey goose wing thro' Lady Marian's casement.

LITTLE JOHN

Oh, ay, and a pink nosegay tied beneath it.
Now, master, you'll forgive your Little John,--
But that's midsummer madness and the may
Is only half in flower as yet. But why--
You are wounded--why are you so pale?

ROBIN

No--no--
Not wounded; but oh, my good faithful friend,
She is not there! I wished to send her warning.
I could not creep much closer; but I swear
I think the castle is in the hands of John.
I saw some men upon the battlements,
Not hers--I know--not hers!

LITTLE JOHN

Hist, who comes here?

[He seizes his bow and stands ready to shoot.]

ROBIN

Stop, man, it is the fool. Thank God, the fool,
Shadow-of-a-Leaf, my Marian's dainty fool.
How now, good fool, what news? What news?

[Enter SHADOW-OF-A-LEAF.]

SHADOW-OF-A-LEAF

Good fool!
Should I be bad, sir, if I chanced to bring
No news at all? That is the wise man's way.
Thank heaven, I've lost my wits. I am but a leaf
Dancing upon the wild winds of the world,
A prophet blown before them. Well, this evening,
It is that lovely grey wind from the West
That silvers all the fields and all the seas,
And I'm the herald of May!

ROBIN

Come, Shadow-of-a-Leaf,
I pray thee, do not jest.

SHADOW-OF-A-LEAF

I do not jest.
I am vaunt-courier to a gentleman,
A sweet slim page in Lincoln green who comes,
Wood-knife on hip, and wild rose in his face,
With golden news of Marian. Oh, his news
Is one crammed honeycomb, swelling with sweetness
In twenty thousand cells; but delicate!
So send thy man aside.

ROBIN

Go, Little John.

[LITTLE JOHN goes into the cave.]

Well, Shadow-of-a-Leaf, where is he?

SHADOW-OF-A-LEAF

At this moment
His hair is tangled in a rose bush: hark,
He swears, like a young leopard! Nay, he is free.
Come, master page, here is that thief of love,
Give him your message. I'll to Little John.

[Exit into the cave. Enter MARIAN, as a page in Lincoln green,
her face muffled in a hood.]

ROBIN

Good even, master page, what is thy news
Of Lady Marian?

[She stands silent.]

Answer me quickly, come,
Hide not thy face!

[She still stands muffled and silent.]

Come, boy, the fool is chartered,
Not thou; and I'll break off this hazel switch
And make thee dance if thou not answer me.
What? Silent still? Sirrah, this hazel wand
Shall lace thee till thou tingle, top to toe.
I'll ...

MARIAN

[Unmuffling.]

Robin!

ROBIN

[Catches her in his arms with a cry.]

Marian! Marian!

MARIAN

Fie upon you,
Robin, you did not know me.

ROBIN

[Embracing her.]

Oh, you seemed
Ten thousand miles away. This is not moonlight,
And I am not Endymion. Could I dream
My Dian would come wandering through the fern
Before the sunset? Even that rose your face
You muffled in its own green leaves.

MARIAN

But you,
Were hidden in the heart of Sherwood, Robin,
Hidden behind a million mighty boughs,
And yet I found you.

ROBIN

Ay, the young moon stole
In pity down to her poor shepherd boy;
But he could never climb the fleecy clouds
Up to her throne, never could print one kiss
On her immortal lips. He lay asleep
Among the poppies and the crags of Latmos,
And she came down to him, his queen stole down.

MARIAN

Oh, Robin, first a rose and then a moon,
A rose that breaks at a breath and falls to your feet,
The fickle moon--Oh, hide me from the world;
For there they say love goes by the same law!
Let me be outlawed then. I cannot change.
Sweetheart, sweetheart, Prince John will hunt me down!
Prince John--Queen Elinor will hunt me down!

ROBIN

Queen Elinor! Nay, but tell me what this means?
How came you here?

MARIAN

The Queen--she came last night,
Made it an odious kind of praise to me
That he, not three months wedded to his bride,
Should--pah!
And then she said five hundred men
Were watching round the borders of the wood;
But she herself would take me safely through them,
Said that I should be safer here with Robin,
She had your name so pat--and I gave way.

[Enter QUEEN ELINOR behind. She conceals herself to listen.]

ROBIN

Marian, she might have trapped you to Prince John.

MARIAN

No; no; I think she wanted me to guide her
Here to your hiding place. She wished to see you
Herself, unknown to John, I know not why.
It was my only way. Her skilful tongue
Quite won my father over, made him think,
Poor father, clinging to his lands again,
He yet might save them. And so, without ado
(It will be greatly to the joy of Much,
Your funny little man), I bade my maid
Jenny, go pack her small belongings up
This morning, and to follow with Friar Tuck
And Widow Scarlet. They'll be here anon.

ROBIN

Where did you leave the Queen?

MARIAN

Robin, she tried
To kill me! We were deep within the wood
And she began to tell me a wild tale,
Saying that I reminded her of days
When Robin was her page, and how you came
To Court, a breath of April in her life,
And how you worshipped her, and how she grew
To love you. But she saw you loved me best
(So would she mix her gall and lies with honey),
So she would let you go. And then she tried
To turn my heart against you, bade me think
Of all the perils of your outlawry,
Then flamed with anger when she found my heart
Steadfast; and when I told her we drew nigh
The cave, she bade me wait and let her come
First, here, to speak with you. Some devil's trick
Gleamed in her smile, the way some women have
Of smiling with their lips, wreathing the skin
In pleasant ripples, laughing with their teeth,
While the cold eyes watch, cruel as a snake's
That fascinates a bird. I'd not obey her.
She whipped a dagger out. Had it not been
For Shadow-of-a-Leaf, who dogged us all the way,
Poor faithful fool, and leapt out at her hand,
She would have killed me. Then she darted away
Like a wild thing into the woods, trying to find
Your hiding place most like.

ROBIN

O Marian, why,
Why did you trust her? Listen, who comes here?

[Enter FRIAR TUCK, JENNY and WIDOW SCARLET.]

Ah, Friar Tuck!

MARIAN

Good Jenny!

ROBIN

And Widow Scarlet!

FRIAR TUCK

O children, children, this is thirsty weather!
The heads I have cracked, the ribs I have thwacked, the bones
I have bashed with my good quarter-staff, to bring
These bits of womankind through Sherwood Forest.

ROBIN

What, was there scuffling, friar?

FRIAR TUCK

Some two or three
Pounced on us, ha! ha! ha!

JENNY

A score at least,
Mistress, most unchaste ruffians.

FRIAR TUCK

They've gone home,
Well chastened by the Church. This pastoral staff
Mine oaken Pax Vobiscum, sent 'em home
To think about their sins, with watering eyes.
You never saw a bunch of such blue faces,
Bumpy and juicy as a bunch of grapes
Bruised in a Bacchanalian orgy, dripping
The reddest wine a man could wish to see.

ROBIN

I picture it--those big brown hands of thine
Grape-gathering at their throttles, ha! ha! ha!
Come, Widow Scarlet, come, look not so sad.

WIDOW SCARLET

O master, master, they have named the day
For killing of my boy.

ROBIN

They have named the day
For setting of him free, then, my good dame.
Be not afraid. We shall be there, eh, Friar?
Grape-gathering, eh?

FRIAR

Thou'lt not be there thyself.
My son, the game's too dangerous now, methinks.

ROBIN

I shall be there myself. The game's too good
To lose. We'll all be there. You're not afraid,
Marian, to spend a few short hours alone
Here in the woods with Jenny.

MARIAN

Not for myself,
Robin.

ROBIN

We shall want every hand that day,
And you'll be safe enough. You know we go
Disguised as gaping yokels, old blind men,
With patches on their eyes, poor wandering beggars,
Pedlars with pins and poking-sticks to sell;
And when the time is come--a merry blast
Rings out upon a bugle and suddenly
The Sheriff is aware that Sherwood Forest
Has thrust its green boughs up beneath his feet.
Off go the cloaks and all is Lincoln green,
Great thwacking clubs and twanging bows of yew.
Oh, we break up like nature thro' the laws
Of that dark world; and then, good Widow Scarlet,
Back to the cave we come and your good Will
Winds his big arm about you once again.
Go, Friar, take her in and make her cosy.
Jenny, your Much will grow three feet at least
With joy to welcome you. He is in the cave.

[FRIAR TUCK and WIDOW SCARLET go towards the cave.]

FRIAR TUCK

Now for a good bowse at a drinking can.
I've got one cooling in the cave, unless
That rascal, Little John, has drunk it all.

[Exeunt into cave.]

JENNY

[To MARIAN.]

Mistress, I haven't spoke a word to you
For nigh three ho