The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 1883

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Preface-Prologue

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Epilogue

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Part 6Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 6, Chapter 1 Summary: “Little John Turns Barefoot Friar”

One spring day, Robin, Little John, and Friar Tuck decide to don disguises and roam about looking for adventure. Little John disguises himself as a friar (although the robe is too short for him), and Robin hopes to exchange clothes with a beggar along the way.

Little John meets a group of pretty young women carrying baskets of eggs to market; he helps them carry the eggs and shares a drink with them before departing. At an inn, he meets a pair of self-important friars, one fat and the other thin. He decides to have some fun with them and runs with them while they ride on their donkeys, embarrassing them in front of the people they pass. When Little John asks the friars for money to buy a loaf of bread, they say that have none. Tongue-in-cheek, Little John offers a prayer to St. Dunstan to provide money for the friars. When he reaches into their pouches, he finds 10 shillings apiece. He takes nine shillings from each friar and leaves them one shilling apiece, claiming that this was his due from St. Dunstan.

Part 6, Chapter 2 Summary: “Robin Hood Turns Beggar”

Meanwhile, Robin Hood meets a jolly, stout beggar along the road and shares a meal with him. When Robin asks the beggar to exchange clothes with him, the beggar refuses, and the two men come to blows. Fairly beaten, the beggar finally agrees to the exchange and is happy to be wearing Robin’s Lincoln green suit.

Robin Hood comes across a group of four dishonest beggars who pretend to be blind, deaf, dumb, and lame, respectively. When they start talking to Robin in beggar’s jargon, which Robin does not understand, Robin gets angry. The beggars turn on him, believing him to be a spy. They attack Robin, but he knocks two of the beggars out, and the other two flee. Robin takes the 50 pounds of gold money that each of the unconscious beggars—"thieving knaves”—has on him.

Next, Robin meets a dealer in corn who is notorious for his corrupt practices and for making money on the backs of poor people. With a gentle threat, Robin demands he take off his shoes and give him the gold coins that he has hidden there. Robin returns to Sherwood Forest, and he and Little John compare the adventures they have had that day.

Part 6 Analysis

Part 6 does not so much advance the plot of the book as string together some amusing episodes involving mistaken identity.

Disguises play an important role in The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood. They frequently allow Robin and his friends to go out unrecognized and carry out various mischief. Here, we have two different disguises. Little John dons a friar’s robe—one of several times in the book that a character or characters disguise themselves as friars, thus showing the importance of such religious men in the society of the time. (The other instances are Will Stutely in Part 1, Chapter 3; Robin Hood in Part 7, Chapter 2; and King Richard and his men in Part 8 Chapter 2.) Little John’s disguise allows him to mix in with, and play a prank on, two self-important friars at an inn—yet another example of pompous clerics in the book. His prank both cuts the friars down to size and deprives them of a large part of the money they were carrying.

Then, in Chapter 2, Robin Hood disguises himself as a beggar after having enacted a comeuppance on a corrupt corn dealer. This episode presents a change of perspective: Now, it is the poor who also have the capacity to be corrupt, dishonest, and violent. Thus, we see that the rich and powerful do not have a monopoly on vice.