For,
indeed, I do find in myself certain indications and admonitions
that my day has past its noon; and none more cogent than this:
that daily of bad wine I grow more intolerant, and of good wine
have a keener and more fastidious relish. There is no surer
symptom of receding years. The ferryman is my faithful varlet.
I send him on some pious errand, that I may meditate in ghostly
privacy, when my presence in the forest can best be spared:
and when can it be better spared than now, seeing that the
neighbourhood of Prince John, and his incessant perquisitions
for Marian, have made the forest too hot to hold more of us
than are needful to keep up a quorum, and preserve unbroken
the continuity of our forest-dominion? For, in truth, without your
greenwood majesties, we have hardly the wit to live in a body,
and at the same time to keep our necks out of jeopardy,
while that arch-rebel and traitor John infests the precincts
of our territory."
The friar now conducted them to his peaceful cell, where he spread
his frugal board with fish, venison, wild-fowl, fruit, and canary.
Under the compound operation of this materia medica Robin's wounds
healed apace, and the friar, who hated minstrelsy, began as usual
chirping in his cups. Robin and Marian chimed in with his tuneful
humour till the midnight moon peeped in upon their revelry.
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