Page 387 - the-merry-adventures-of-robin-hood

ing to sound his bugle once more. He raised it to his lips;
he blew a blast. ‘Tirila, lirila,’ the sweet, clear notes went
winding down the forest paths, coming back again from the
more distant bosky shades in faint echoes of sound, ‘Tirila,
lirila, tirila, lirila,’ until it faded away and was lost.
Now it chanced that on that very morn Little John was
walking through a spur of the forest upon certain mat-
ters of business, and as he paced along, sunk in meditation,
the faint, clear notes of a distant bugle horn came to his
ear. As leaps the stag when it feels the arrow at its heart, so
leaped Little John when that distant sound met his ear. All
the blood in his body seemed to rush like a flame into his
cheeks as he bent his head and listened. Again came the
bugle note, thin and clear, and yet again it sounded. Then
Little John gave a great, wild cry of yearning, of joy, and
yet of grief, and, putting down his head, he dashed into the
thicket. Onward he plunged, crackling and rending, as the
wild boar rushes through the underbrush. Little recked he
of thorns and briers that scratched his flesh and tore his
clothing, for all he thought of was to get, by the shortest
way, to the greenwood glade whence he knew the sound of
the bugle horn came. Out he burst from the covert, at last, a
shower of little broken twigs falling about him, and, with-
out pausing a moment, rushed forward and flung himself at
Robin’s feet. Then he clasped his arms around the master’s
knees, and all his body was shaken with great sobs; nei-
ther could Robin nor Allan a Dale speak, but stood looking
down at Little John, the tears rolling down their cheeks.
While they thus stood, seven royal rangers rushed into

The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood