Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar earlier version, Robin Hood good-humoredly refuses further combat; in both earlier and later versions Robin invites him to join the band. Howard Pyle used this tale in his "The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood" as part of the tale of Alan-a-Dale: Robin needed a priest who would perform the wedding ceremony in defiance of authority, and Will Scarlet proposed Friar Tuck. The Percy Folio version of the ballad begins with the stanza: Robert Graves in his "English and Scottish Ballads" used this stanza to support his argument for pagan survivals in the Robin Hood legend, and for the popular survival
Robin Hood legend. In the 19th century the Robin Hood legend was first specifically adapted for children. Children's editions of the garlands were produced and in 1820 a children's edition of Ritson's "Robin Hood" collection. Children's Robin Hood novels began to appear. It is not that children did not read Robin Hood stories before, but this is the first appearance of a Robin Hood literature specifically aimed at them. A very influential example of these children's novels was Pierce Egan the Younger's "Robin Hood and Little John" (1840). This was adapted into French by Alexandre Dumas in "Le Prince des Voleurs" (1872)