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There were, perhaps, a score of them already gathered, when a sound of
suppressed cheering arose close by among the hawthorns, and immediately
after five or six woodmen carrying a stretcher debauched upon the lawn.
A tall, lusty fellow, somewhat grizzled, and as brown as a smoked ham,
walked before them with an air of some authority, his bow at his back, a
bright boar-spear in his hand.
"Lads!" he cried, "good fellows all, and my right merry friends, y' have
sung this while on a dry whistle and lived at little ease. But what said
I ever? Abide Fortune constantly; she turneth, turneth swift. And lo!
here is her little firstling--even that good creature, ale!"
There was a murmur of applause as the bearers set down the stretcher and
displayed a goodly cask.
"And now haste ye, boys," the man continued. "There is work toward. A
handful of archers are but now come to the ferry; murrey and blue is
their wear; they are our butts--they shall all taste arrows--no man of
them shall struggle through this wood. For, lads, we are here some fifty
strong, each man of us most foully wronged; for some they have lost
lands, and some friends; and some they have been outlawed--all oppressed!
Who, then, hath done this evil? Sir Daniel, by the rood! Shall he then
profit? shall he sit snug in our houses? shall he till our fields? shall
he suck the bone he robbed us of? I trow not. He getteth him strength
at law; he gaineth cases; nay, there is one case he shall not gain--I
have a writ here at my belt that, please the saints, shall conquer him."
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