Note 1 — THE LIFE OF ROBIN HOOD.

(1) “Former biographers,” &c.] Such, that is, as have already appeared in print, since a sort of manuscript life in the Sloane Library will appear to have been of some service. The first of these respectable personages is the author, or rather compiler, of “The noble birth and gallant achievements of that remarkable outlaw Robin Hood; together with a true account of the many merry extravagant exploits he played; in twelve several stories: newly collected by an ingenious antiquary. London, printed by W. O.” [William Onley], 4to, black letter, no date. These “several stories,” in fact, are only so many of the songs in the common Garland transposed; and the “ingenious antiquary,” who strung them together, has known so little of his trade, that he sets out with informing us of his hero’s banishment by King Henry the Eighth. The above is supposed to be the “small merry book” called Robin Hood, mentioned in a list of “books, ballads, and histories, printed for and sold by William Thackeray at the Angel in Duck-lane” (about 1680), preserved in one of the volumes of old ballads (part of Bagford’s collection) in the British Museum.