"
"But I will commute," said the friar; "for twenty marks a year
duly paid into my ghostly pocket you shall call your daughter
Mawd two hundred times a day."
"Gramercy," said the baron, "and I agree, honest friar, when I can get
twenty marks to pay: for till Prince John be beaten from Nottingham,
my rents are like to prove but scanty."
"I will trust," said the friar, "and thus let us ratify the stipulation;
so shall our laws and your infringement run together in an amicable parallel."
"But," said Little John, "this is a bad precedent, master friar.
It is turning discipline into profit, penalty into perquisite,
public justice into private revenue. It is rank corruption, master friar."
"Why are laws made?" said the friar. "For the profit of somebody.
Of whom? Of him who makes them first, and of others as it may happen.
Was not I legislator in the last article, and shall I not thrive
by my own law?"
"Well then, sweet Mawd," said the baron, "I must leave you, Mawd:
your life is very well for the young and the hearty, but it squares
not with my age or my humour. I must house, Mawd. I must find refuge:
but where? That is the question."
"Where Sir Guy of Gamwell has found it," said Robin Hood, "near the borders
of Barnsdale. There you may dwell in safety with him and fair Alice,
till King Richard return, and Little John shall give you safe conduct.
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