His music is specially characterized by grace and melodiousness. Hatton died in 1886. Robin Hood. The pastoral cantata of "Robin Hood" was written for the Bradford (England) Triennial Festival of 1856, Sims Reeves creating the part of the hero. Its name suggests the well-known story of the greenwood outlaw which has been charmingly versified by George Linley in the libretto. The personages are Maid Marian, Robin Hood, Little John, and "The Bishop." Maid Marian, it will be remembered, was the mistress who followed Robin into the Sherwood Forest and shared his wild life; and Little John was his stalwart lieutenant, whose name was transposed after he joined the band, thus heightening the incongruity between his name and his great size. The incident contained in Linley's poem appears to have been suggested by Robin Hood's penchant for capturing bishops and other ecclesiastics, notwithstanding his religious professions, which were exemplified by the retention of Friar Tuck as chaplain in the bold archer's household; or it may be based upon the historical story of the expedition which Edward II. and some of his retainers, disguised as monks, made into the forest for the purpose of exterminating the outlaws and thus stopping their slaughter of the royal deer. As the old story goes, they were led into an ambuscade by a forester who had agreed to conduct them to the haunts of Robin, and were captured. When Robin recognized the King in the disguise of the abbot, he craved forgiveness for himself and his band, which was granted upon condition that he should accompany his sovereign to Court and take a place in the royal household. The old collection of ballads, "The Lytell Geste of Robyn Hood," tells the same story and continues it, relating how after "dwelling in the Kynge's courte" a year, he tired of it and obtained permission to make a visit to the woods again, but forfeited his word and never returned, dying at last in Kirklees priory, through the treachery of the abbess, and how in his last moments he blew a loud blast on his horn, summoning Little John from the forest, to whom, after he had forced his way into his chamber, the dying Robin said: "Give me my bent bow in my hand, And an arrow I'll let free, And where that arrow is taken up, There let my grave digged be."