during the winter, and spent their time
making stores of bows and arrows, and mending their boots and clothes.

This bright sunshiny morning Robin felt dull and restless, so he took
his bow and arrows, and started off through the forest in search of
adventure.

He wandered on for some time without meeting any one. Presently he
came to a river. It was wide and deep, swollen by the winter rains.
It was crossed by a very slender, shaky bridge, so narrow, that if two
people tried to pass each other on it, one would certainly fall into
the water.

Robin began to cross the bridge, before he noticed that a great, tall
man, the very tallest man he had ever seen, was crossing too from the
other side.

"Go back and wait until I have come over," he called out as soon as he
noticed the stranger.

The stranger laughed, and called out in reply, "I have as good a right
to the bridge as you. _You_ can go back till _I_ get across."

This made Robin very angry. He was so accustomed to being obeyed that
he was very much astonished too. Between anger and astonishment he
hardly knew what he did.

He drew an arrow from his quiver, and fitting it to his bow, called
out again, "If you don't go back I'll shoot."

"If you do, I'll beat you till you are black and blue," replied the
stranger.

"Quoth bold Robin Hood, 'Thou dost prate like an ass,
For, were I to bend my bow,
I could send a dart quite through thy proud heart,
Before thou couldst strike a blow.'"

"If I talk like an ass you talk like a coward," replied the stranger.
"Do you call it fair to stand with your bow and arrow ready to shoot
at me when I have only a stick to defend myself with? I tell you, you
are a coward. You are afraid of the beating I would give you."

Robin was not a coward, and he was not afraid. So he threw his bow and
arrows on the bank behind him.

"You are a big, boastful bully," he said. "Just wait there until I get
a stick. I hope I may give you as good a beating as you deserve."

The stranger laughed. "I won't run away; don't be afraid," he said.

Robin Hood stepped to a thicket of trees and cut himself a good, thick
oak stick. While he was doing this, he looked at the stranger, and saw
that he was not only taller but much stronger than himself.

However, that did not frighten Robin in the least. He was rather glad
of it indeed. The stranger had said he was a coward. He meant to prove
to him that he was not.

Back he came with a