d. Many a better man than the Sheriff kissed the sod that day,
but at last, Sir William Dale being wounded and most of his men slain,
he withdrew, beaten, and left the forest. But scores of good fellows
were left behind him, stretched out all stiff beneath the sweet green
boughs.

But though Robin Hood had beaten off his enemies in fair fight, all this
lay heavily upon his mind, so that he brooded over it until a fever
seized upon him. For three days it held him, and though he strove to
fight it off, he was forced to yield at last. Thus it came that, on the
morning of the fourth day, he called Little John to him, and told him
that he could not shake the fever from him, and that he would go to his
cousin, the prioress of the nunnery near Kirklees, in Yorkshire, who was
a skillful leech, and he would have her open a vein in his arm and take
a little blood from him, for the bettering of his health. Then he bade
Little John make ready to go also, for he might perchance need aid in
his journeying. So Little John and he took their leave of the others,
and Robin Hood bade Will Stutely be the captain of the band until they
should come back. Thus they came by easy stages and slow journeying
until they reached the Nunnery of Kirklees.

Now Robin had done much to aid this cousin of his; for it was through
King Richard's love of him that she had been made prioress of the place.
But there is nought in the world so easily forgot as gratitude; so, when
the Prioress of Kirklees had heard how her cousin, the Earl of
Huntingdon, had thrown away his earldom and gone back again to Sherwood,
she was vexed to the soul, and feared lest her cousinship with him
should bring the King's wrath upon her also. Thus it happened that when
Robin came to her and told her how he wished her services as leech, she
began plotting ill against him in her mind, thinking that by doing evil
to him she might find favor with his enemies. Nevertheless, she kept
this well to herself and received Robin with seeming kindness. She led
him up the winding stone stair to a room which was just beneath the
eaves of a high, round tower; but she would not let Little John come
with him.

So the poor yeoman turned his feet away from the door of the nunnery,
and left his master in the hands of the women. But, though he did not
come in, neither did he go far away; for he laid him down in a little
glade near by, where he could watch the place that Robin abided, like
some gr