A short, wistful verse about Robin Hood in the greenwood and Little John away in town. It reads more like a snatch of old ballad than a nursery rhyme, which is exactly what it is.
From Mother Goose / Nursery Rhymes (traditional). See the whole collection.
Robin Hood, Robin Hood,
Is in the mickle wood!
Little John, Little John,
He to the town is gone.
Robin Hood, Robin Hood,
Telling his beads,
All in the greenwood
Among the green weeds.
Little John, Little John,
If he comes no more,
Robin Hood, Robin Hood,
We shall fret full sore!
About this rhyme
Printed by J. O. Halliwell, 1842
Robin Hood's stories are hundreds of years old, sung in ballads long before anyone wrote them down for children. This short verse is a nursery offcut of all that. James Orchard Halliwell printed it in his Nursery Rhymes of England in 1842 and noted it was well known to children at Worksop, in Nottinghamshire, deep in Robin Hood country. 'Mickle' is simply an old word for big, so the mickle wood is the great wood, the greenwood itself.
It falls into two halves, so share it out. You take the Robin Hood lines, a child takes Little John, and you swap the calls back and forth. March on the spot while you chant. The names carry it.
Public domain. Text from The Real Mother Goose (Blanche Fisher Wright, 1916), via Project Gutenberg. View the source edition