ereabouts shall I hit the cap?"]

"No," said Robin; "just at the top of the brim."

"Very well," said the big fellow, standing up very straight and
rather sidewise, as he held his bow at his left arm's length,
slowly drew the arrow to the head, and then as Robin gazed in the
direction of the indistinctly seen hat hanging on the tree-trunk--

Twang!

The arrow had been loosed, and the bow had given forth a strange
deep musical sound.

Robin looked sharply at Little John, and the big outlaw looked down
at him.

"Where did that arrow go?" said the boy.

"Let's see," said Little John.

"I don't think we shall ever find it again," continued Robin.

They walked back, the outlaw very slowly, and Robin quite fast so
as to keep up with him.

"Perhaps not," said Little John, "but I don't often lose my arrows."

"This one has gone right through the ferns," thought Robin, and he
felt glad with the thought of the big fellow having missed the
mark, but as they walked nearer, he kept his eyes fixed upon the
great trunk dimly seen in the shade, being tripped up twice by the
bracken fronds; but he saved himself from a fall and watched the
tree trunk still, while the hat hanging on the old bough grew
plainer, just as it had been before.

They had walked back nearly three parts of the way when Robin
suddenly saw something which made him start, for there was a tiny
bit of something white above something dark, and those marks were
not on the brim of the hat before.

The next minute Robin's eyes began to open wider, for he knew that
he was looking at the feathered end of the arrow, pointing straight
at him; and directly after, as he stepped a little on one side to
avoid an ant-hill, he could see the whole of the arrow except the
point, which had passed through the brim of the hat.

"Why, you hit it!" he cried excitedly.

"Well, that's what I tried to do," said Little John.

"But you hit it just in the place I said."

"Yes, you told me to," said Little John, smiling. "That's how you
must learn to shoot when you grow up to be a man."

Young Robin said nothing, but stood rubbing one ear very gently,
and staring at the hat.

"Well," said Little John, smiling down at his companion, "what are
you thinking about?"

"I was thinking that it is very wonderful for you to stand so far
off and shoot like that."

"Were you, now?" said Little John. "Well, it is not wonderful at
all. If you keep on trying for years you will b