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001 - Stories Of Robin Hood · Story of Robin Hood

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of the Story of Robin Hood. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Devora Allen, The Story of Robin Hood by
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  Speaker 1: Bertha Evangeline Bush. Stories of Robin Hood and what of
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  Speaker 1: Peter the Plowman? He was a good friend of mine, Alack.
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  Speaker 1: Peter the Plowman hath been hanged, and his wife and
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  Speaker 1: little ones turned out of their home to beg The
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  Speaker 1: father of young Robin Hood, with his little son at
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  Speaker 1: his side, had met a man from his old home
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  Speaker 1: and was eagerly questioning him about the welfare of his
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  Speaker 1: old neighbors. But much of the news was sad, for
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  Speaker 1: the times were evil in England. The Normans had conquered
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  Speaker 1: the country and were the lords and officials in the land,
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  Speaker 1: and they cruelly oppressed the common people, who were Saxons.
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  Speaker 1: The father said not a word, although his face grew
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  Speaker 1: very sad, But the boy beside him burst out indignantly,
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  Speaker 1: But why should such a thing be done? Peter the
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  Speaker 1: Plowman was one of the best men I ever knew,
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  Speaker 1: and his wife was as good and kind as an angel.
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  Speaker 1: Why should such a dreadful thing be done to them?
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  Speaker 1: Because he shot deer in the king's forest. But indeed
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  Speaker 1: he had an excuse for breaking the law, if ever
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  Speaker 1: a man did. His crops had been destroyed by the
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  Speaker 1: huntsmen riding through them. The tax collector had taken all
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  Speaker 1: that he had, and his children were crying for hunger.
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  Speaker 1: He shot the deer that they might have food to eat,
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  Speaker 1: but the sheriff caught him and hung him for it.
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  Speaker 1: As to the reason why his wife was turned out
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  Speaker 1: from her home with her orphaned children, the abbot wanted
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  Speaker 1: that bit of ground for an extension to his garden,
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  Speaker 1: So out the poor folks must go. It's a shame,
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  Speaker 1: cried the boy with flashing eyes. Such laws as that
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  Speaker 1: are wicked laws and ought to be broken. The greedy
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  Speaker 1: lords and rich ease loving churchmen strip the people bare
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  Speaker 1: and go rolling in wealth, while the rest of the
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  Speaker 1: people are starving. Hush, boy, hush, said the news teller, warningly,
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  Speaker 1: our England is indeed cruelly misgoverned, but it is not
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  Speaker 1: safe to say so, for the very walls have ears,
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  Speaker 1: and many have been hanged because their tongues wag too freely,
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  Speaker 1: as well as for shooting the king's deer. But the king,
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  Speaker 1: the King is good, faltered the boy. He had been
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  Speaker 1: taught to love and reverence the king. The king would
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  Speaker 1: be a good king if he would stay at home
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  Speaker 1: and govern his people. But he is off at war
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  Speaker 1: all the time, and the nobles and officers he appoints
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  Speaker 1: grind the people as a miller grinds the wheat between
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  Speaker 1: his great millstones. They rob them continually, And the rich
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  Speaker 1: are growing richer and more greedy, and the poor growing
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  Speaker 1: poorer and more miserable all the time. When I am
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  Speaker 1: a man, said the boy robin Hood, I will make
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  Speaker 1: the rich give up a portion of their wealth to
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  Speaker 1: the poor, and then all will be provided for. It
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  Speaker 1: was not strange, perhaps, considering the evils of the times,
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  Speaker 1: that this boy robin Hood, when he became a man,
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  Speaker 1: did do just what he said, and gathered a band
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  Speaker 1: of men about him in the forest, whose pledged purpose
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  Speaker 1: was to despoil the rich of ill gotten wealth and
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  Speaker 1: lend a helping hand to the poor. The normans called
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  Speaker 1: them highway robbers, but the common people called them the
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  Speaker 1: merry men of greenwood, and loved them, for they were
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  Speaker 1: often helped out of trouble by them. Their robbing was
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  Speaker 1: certainly wrong according to our standards, but robin Hood did
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  Speaker 1: not think it was wrong. He took from the rich
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  Speaker 1: what they had wrung unjustly from the poor to give
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  Speaker 1: it back to the poor, and he thought that it
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  Speaker 1: was right. Outlaw though he was, he stood ever for
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  Speaker 1: justice and fairness as he saw it. He was loyal
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  Speaker 1: to the king, though he resisted the unjust exactions made
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  Speaker 1: in the King's name. He was loyal to the church,
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  Speaker 1: and prayed most reverently for himself and his band. It
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  Speaker 1: was his pride that he and his men had never
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  Speaker 1: harmed a woman, or burned a haystack, or robbed a husbandman,
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  Speaker 1: or hurt a parish priest. The Normans did all these things.
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  Speaker 1: Compared with their actions, robin Hood's standards were wonderfully high.
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  Speaker 1: He was trying to be a reformer, and though he
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  Speaker 1: went about his work in a wrong way, still he
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  Speaker 1: did much good. As the quaint old ballad says about
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  Speaker 1: him in queer spelling, which I revised, Christ, have mercy
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  Speaker 1: on his soul that died on the road, for he
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  Speaker 1: was a good outlaw and did poor man much good.
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  Speaker 1: He was brave and kind and merry always, and all
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  Speaker 1: the English people, except england oppressors loved him with all
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  Speaker 1: their hearts, and delighted in his adventures. The story of
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  Speaker 1: what he did was put into songs and sung at
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  Speaker 1: every fireside, and no man was better loved than this
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  Speaker 1: outlaw with a price upon his head. Here are a
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  Speaker 1: few stories of Robin Hood and his men, and a
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  Speaker 1: great many more may be found, which are well worth
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  Speaker 1: your reading. End of Chapter one,