Page 205 - the-merry-adventures-of-robin-hood

Robin Hood Aids a

Sorrowful Knight

O PASSED the gentle springtime away in budding beau-
Sty; its silver showers and sunshine, its green meadows
and its flowers. So, likewise, passed the summer with its
yellow sunlight, its quivering heat and deep, bosky foli-
age, its long twilights and its mellow nights, through which
the frogs croaked and fairy folk were said to be out on the
hillsides. All this had passed and the time of fall had come,
bringing with it its own pleasures and joyousness; for now,
when the harvest was gathered home, merry bands of glean-
ers roamed the country about, singing along the roads in
the daytime, and sleeping beneath the hedgerows and the
hay-ricks at night. Now the hips burned red in the tangled
thickets and the hews waxed black in the hedgerows, the
stubble lay all crisp and naked to the sky, and the green
leaves were fast turning russet and brown. Also, at this mer-
ry season, good things of the year are gathered in in great
store. Brown ale lies ripening in the cellar, hams and bacon
hang in the smoke-shed, and crabs are stowed away in the
straw for roasting in the wintertime, when the north wind
piles the snow in drifts around the gables and the fire crack-
les warm upon the hearth.
So passed the seasons then, so they pass now, and so they

0 The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood