The morning call., 1891-02-08
.WAKENAN'S
FANDERINGS.
Still in the Picturesque Land Of The
Famous Robin Hood.
STOPPING AT THE LONE TREE INN"
Mistaken for PlaY-AGt0r or MOuItGbalk-A
= Man who Did Not Want Il Said That
Arnold BY Nottingham Is Ilh0SDitable.
ROBIN Hood a Butchers Apprentice The
Oaks Of Sherwood Forest
STOPPING At THE LONE TREE nm"
Special TO THE SUNDAY CALL

e. fep E<|EsS5loI n HIS, 10 AtuOit, Oll MY
~ G&HS return way to Noting
-LSzs 22s=zzzszzsEzzEa ham. It was late at
night and no conveyance or train could be
had at the ancient city. The long, lane
like manufacturing hamlet possessed but
two inns. These were ''public-houses"-
roadside dram-shops-rat than hostelries
At one had been refused entertainment for
the night and warned away, because the old
lady who kept it took good English oath
was piay-actor or other mountebank and
would, somehow, depart too early in the
morning with more than my reckoning. At
the other, The Lone Tree Inn," the mod
esty of the two maiden ladies in charge for
bade the housing of an untouched man. l
could sit in the tap-rOom parlor on the high
leather-covered settles until the closing, at
midnight. Then l must go.
Utterly fatigued from long days wan
dering in Robin Hoods land. and desperate
at the prospect of an all-night'S tramp into
Nottingham. how l longed for the welcome
Of some hedge-side gypsy camp. Expressing
this in humble protest only further outlawed
me- at the Lone Tree Inn at Arnold.
Then, as l was being invited to take the
road, like gypsy indeed, portly, kindly
faced man came in. He owned the largest
mill in Arnold; was q more powerful man
than the lord of the manor and my fate was
in allegiance while he drank his nightly glass
Of gin and soda, and blinked at me, as min
gled emotions of suspicion, perplexity and
hospitality played over his good English
face. The spinSteT barmaidS, the rough
factory-handS and all the tap-room hang
eIs-on of a mill town awaited the great
mans dictum regarding the intruder with
respectful silence. This was that it never,
never should be said that Arnold-by-Not-
tInglam, was InhOSpltable or dlScOurteouS
to a stranger "Hear!-hear" came from
the taD-rOom contingent. He might be a
play-actoT, he might be mOuntebank, he
might even consort with those outcasts of
society, the horrid gypSieS, but again it
hUuld never be said that Arnold-by-Not-
tingham refused the aiding hand. HEAR
hear!-hear!' roared the aud ence all. So, as
some of the great mans friends, some hon.
est Nottingham butchers, would be directly
returning home from OXtoa way, by grace
ami shift | was to be got into one of their
carts, and thence to old Nottingham and an
Inn. Charging the crowd thus and the
score to myself, which was gratefully ex-
plunged from the records of Lone Tree
Inn" the great man of Arnold went his way,
WHILE I WENT TO SLEEP.
How long had been doing l knew not,
but when l awakened it was with a sense
OF being shot through the eartl'S circum-
ambient blue Four huge fellows en- .ased
IN WOODEN sacks to their feet had tossed me
into one Of their carts like a quarter of
beef. L struck upon pile of freshly
slaughtered pork in a comfortable position
al the edge OF the caIt-boX, while ''0w are
ye now, old cOckney?' Nigh onto sixteen
stone weight?' The guvenor's cold stiff
with cheerP' and like suggestive chaffings
were mingled with partings from the crowd
at the Lone Tree Inn" There were
half-sc0re of carts, a ore of butchers.
HrUe ayful-vniPa1 Kindly
were, with wonderful hallooings and
song as they pushed their stout
horses at terrific speed down that
broad stone road through the gliStening,
crispy night. Cottage and castle dimly ap-
Eeared and as instantly vanished. COpse
and hedge seemed set in a mad pace the
other way. On We sped to old Nottingham,
frightening belated cottagers with the rush
ing, clamor and song. There were some
superb voices among these rollicking Not
ind among the lowly of all the midland and
northern English shires. But more impress
i've to NE, with my OVID head full of Robin
Hood, than my psrilous seat on the edge of
bounding cart-box, was the character of
he he songs they sang. Every one identified
tile OHtcher's, or "hesher's," vocation with
incidents in the life of Robin Hood.
One of these Sings told how Robin him
self was but hers prentice, and became
an outlaw on account of miserly master
feeding him solely on lights and liver,
and wore the flesh from his bones with
the unmerciful address with which he was
forced to Scrape the fat from the bones of
animals. another related the marvellous
escape from death of a Nottingham butch
er, in the year 1923. when King Edward
IL made his progress into the north
countrie." Enraged at the dearth of meat
in Nottingham, the King called the chief
fiesher of the city before him, and ordered
him. on pain OF death, to proviue four-scOre
gOodly k.ne, dressed for the turnspit, to be
made ready before the dawn of the follow
ing day. This was an impossible task.
Passing from the King presence
THE DOOMED BUTCHER
Encountered a beggar, who, as "a BOOM"
asked only To know the nature of his mis-
fortune and Immediately disappeared. The
butcher passed that day and night preparing
for eternity, and, like a loyal subject, set
forth for the castle at dawn to get his head
and more beautifully dressed careasses of
King Edwards own fallow deer hanging in
the market-place. Each had an arrow
wound in the side, and so it was known
that Robin Hood and his men had saved the
butchers lie, and by the same token cley.
erly challenged a bOnt with the officers of
King Edward himself. Another, the most
rolllcking OF all, went so far as to assert
that the righteousness, the red faces,
the huge paunches, the general good
characteristics of the Nottingham butchers,
are hereditarily due to the progenitor
of them all. Him the ballad asserts TO have
been lordly abbot, noted in the fourteenth
century for both piety and wealth. Robin
Hood and his men had captured the abbot
and his money bags. In return the outlaw
so royalty entertained him that the abbot
fell from grace. The love OF flesh and ale
grew SO strong upon him that ne renounced
MS orders, and became butcher and winner
in Nottingham. The outlaws, now his
friends, supplied his stalls with meat from
the kings forest of Sherwood and his butts
with wine Of which the Deighboring monas-
tereS and priOrieS had been despoiled.
Hence the clerical mold of form, face and
character, as the butchers say in raillery,
and certainly as tradition has transmitted,
OF the Jolly butchers OF Nottingham.
Soon the spires and chimneys of the
ancient city pushed through the line of SAT-
irony night-light above it. Then the strange
caYalcade Numbered along the cobbied
streets, and, after trayersing several narrow
closes, drew up with a crash in front of a
curious old structure near the market-place.
After much shouting, pounding and ringing
an old servitor appeared. Then the butchers
hOisted me from the cart. much the same as
they had shot me into it. Despite my pro-
tests that was dom;ciled at an inn in Peck
Lane, was under their charge. To
AN INN OF THEIR CHOOSING
l must 90; and with terrible threats of re-
prisal to the little old man to whom was
given in charge, should slight be put ON me,
or reckoning be wrong, they departed with
I a rush and roar; the huge inn-door was
locked and bolted, as if against SIEGE and
1--WE climbed the stone stairs to quaint old
chamber, into whose tiny-paned gabls win
dSw the first hesitant light of day was
family trembling from the east.
Wholly in the spirit of tie oddity of the
nights adventure, / related the pretensions
OF the butchers ballads, and asked the old
servant if everybody In Nottingham was
descended from Robin Hood, or some one Of
his noble victims. The old mans pride was
, touched.
. Indeed, no, sirp' be answered, indig-
nantly. None comes Of that stock save
US as serves in pnblic-housesp
Then he stood there, candle in hand, his
gnGrd-hke nose flaming and paling with
awakening spirit, while lie reeled off sundry
other ballads of intrrminable stanzas and
Iteration, showing with undoubted historic
accuracy and outlawed rhyme and rhythm,
pretty nearly the same collection of incl
dents in Robin Hoods career, accounting