You will have need to travel with caution, in disguise and without attendants,
for Prince John commands all this vicinity, and will doubtless lay the country
for you and Marian. Now it is first expedient to dismiss your retainers.
If there be any among them who like our life, they may stay with us
in the greenwood; the rest may return to their homes."
Some of the baron's men resolved to remain with Robin and Marian,
and were furnished accordingly with suits of green, of which Robin
always kept good store.
Marian now declared that as there was danger in the way to Barnsdale,
she would accompany Little John and the baron, as she should not
be happy unless she herself saw her father placed in security.
Robin was very unwilling to consent to this, and assured
her that there was more danger for her than the baron:
but Marian was absolute.
"If so, then," said Robin, "I shall be your guide instead of Little John,
and I shall leave him and Scarlet joint-regents of Sherwood during my absence,
and the voice of Friar Tuck shall be decisive between them if they
differ in nice questions of state policy." Marian objected to this,
that there was more danger for Robin than either herself or the baron:
but Robin was absolute in his turn.
"Talk not of my voice," said the friar; "for if Marian be a damsel errant,
I will be her ghostly esquire.
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