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 old English traditions, the propriety or impropriety of which had never been a matter for concern. His "fair Rosamond" believes herself a wedded wife, and so escapes culpability. His "Maid Marian" wanders through Sherwood Forest under the respectable chaperonage of her father, and will not permit to Robin Hood the harmless liberties common among betrothed lovers.

It is a bit frigid and a bit stilted for the merry outlaws. "If love were all," we might admit that conventionalism had chilled the laureate's pen; but, happily for the great adventures we call life and death, love is not all. The world swings on its way, peopled by other men than lovers; and it is to Tennyson 151