carried off several vessels. Eager for
revenge, and naturally solicitous for the
safety of our seas, Alderman Philpot, a
rich London merchant, at once patriotically
equipped an armed fleet at his own expense,
darted out after Mercer, overtook him,
retook the Scarborough ships, and, in addition,
fifteen richly-laden Spanish vessels;
so virtue, was not merely its own reward in
in Philpot's case. Yorkshire ballads, which
seem to centre round that brave and
generous chief, Robin Hood, have apparently
mixed up some story of him with this
exploit of this sturdy alderman. The old
ballad has it, that on a certain occasion
(a long run of rheumatic wet weather,
perhaps?), the outlaw of merry Sherwood,
growing tired of the green-wood, resolved
to go to Scarborough and turn fisherman.
But Robin, quite out of his element at sea,
and half his time squeamish and uncertain
about the legs as a Margate yachting man,
caught no fish. Suddenly, however, a
French ship of war bears down on the little
Betsy Jane; the master is in sore fear;
but Robin's eye kindles, and his chest
expands.

"Master, tie me to the mast," saith he,
"That at my mark I may stand fair;
And give me my bent bow in my hand,
And never a Frenchman will I spare."

And so fast flew his grey-winged shafts,
that, the Frenchman's deck was soon strewn
will dead men and the scuppers running
blood. Then Robin and his merry men
boarded the helpless vessel, and found in
her, to their infinite delight,

Twelve thousand pound of money bright.

Many legends of Robin indeed prevail in
this part of Yorkshire, for, not far off, near
Whitby, is the bay still named after him,
where tradition says, when hard pressed,
he used to fly to the fishing vessels he kept
there, and, putting to sea, escaped the fangs
of the angry law. On the wild moors beyond
Stoupe Brow, are some British or
Saxon-Danish tumuli, where Robin and Little John
are said to have practised their feats of
archery. From the tower of Whitby Abbey
it was that Robin and his tall lieutenant,
after they had been entertained by Saint
Hilda's monks, gave, at the request of their
hosts, a proof of their skill with the
''crooked stick and the grey goose wing."
Their arrows (no doubt about it ) fell nearly
three miles off in the village of Hawsker,
where (and this entirely clenches it) two
upright stones still indicate where the shafts
fell. When you have passed the din of the
great, smoky Lowmoor ironworks, and left
Whitfield behind, you reach, a few miles
further up the green valley of the Calder,
Kirklees, where all true Yorkshiremen
declare the great outlaw, when sore "distempered
with cold and age," was treacherously
bled to death by his ruthless aunt, an old
prioress, who hated her brave nephew for the
foul scorn he had always shown to priests.
A small closet in the priory gate-house is still
shown as the place where, when bleeding
to death in the bolted den, the dying man
bethought him of his bugle horn, and,
staggering to the window, opened it, and

—blew out weak blasts three.
Then Little John, when hearing him,
As he sat under the tree,
"I fear my master is near dead,
He blows so wearily."

Then faithful Little John tightened his
belt, flew to Kirklees, and breaking locks,
bolts, &c., reached his master, and saw that
he was dying. But Robin, gentle even
under foul wrong, would not hear of Little
John burning down Kirklees Hall and the
treacherous nunnery. "No," said he, nobly,

"I never hurt fair maid in all my time,
Nor at my end shall it be;
But give me my bent bow in my hand,
And a broad arrow I'll let flee,
And where this arrow is taken up,
There shall my grave digg'd be."

And so it was done, and on a spot of high
table land, commanding a fine view of the
sunny glades of Kirklees, there lies the bold
outlaw. An iron railing among thick trees,
encloses a block of stone, on which is
engraved a sham antique inscription, dated
1247. It records the death of Robert Earl of
Huntingdon, and concludes with these lines:

Such outlaws as he and his men
Will England never see again.

In that genuine old classic ballad Robin
Hood's Garland, a final verse runs:

Lay me a green sod under my head,
And another at my feet,
And lay my bent bow by my side,
Which was my music sweet,
And make my grave of gravel and green,
Which is most right and meet.

Let me have length and breadth enough,
With a green sod under my head,
That they may say when I am dead,
Here lies bold Robin Hood.

Yorkshire and the neighbouring counties
are, indeed, full of relics and records of
Robin. At Fountains Abbey they still show
the well beside which he fought the sturdy
Curtal friar. His chair, slipper, and cap
used to be shown at St. Ann's Well, near
Nottingham; there is a Robin Hood's Well
at Skelbrook, near Doncaster; there is a
Robin Hood's Hill above the vale of
Castleton; and Robin Hood's Stride is shown