Two soldiers went down to the hold and released Tell. They bade him get up and come with them. Tell followed them on deck, and stood before the Governor.
“Tell,” said Gessler.
Tell looked at him without speaking.
“Take the helm, Tell,” said Gessler, “and steer the ship through those rocks into the bay beyond, or instant death shall be your lot.”
Without a word Tell took the helmsman’s place, peering keenly into the cloud of foam before him. To right and to left he turned the vessel’s head, and to right again, into the very heart of the spray. They were right among the rocks now, but the ship did not strike on them. Quivering and pitching, she was hurried along, until of a sudden the spray-cloud was behind her, and in front the calm waters of the bay.
Gessler beckoned to the helmsman.
“Take the helm again,” he said.
He pointed to Tell.
“Bind him,” he said to the soldiers.
The soldiers advanced slowly, for they were loath to bind the man who had just saved them from destruction. But the Governor’s orders must he obeyed, so they came towards Tell, carrying ropes with which to bind him.
Tell moved a step back. The ship was gliding past a lofty rock. It was such a rock as Tell had often climbed when hunting the chamois. He acted with the quickness of the hunter. Snatching up the bow and quiver which lay on the deck, he sprang on to the bulwark of the vessel, and, with a mighty leap, gained the rock. Another instant, and he was out of reach.
Gessler roared to his bowmen.
“Shoot! shoot!” he cried.
The bowmen hastily fitted arrow to string. They were too late. Tell was ready before them. There was a hiss as the shaft rushed through the air, and the next moment Gessler the Governor fell dead on the deck, pierced through the heart.
Tell’s second arrow had found its mark, as his first had done.
[Illustration: PLATE XV]
CHAPTER XV
There is not much more of the story of William Tell. The death of Gessler was a signal to the Swiss to rise in revolt, and soon the whole country was up in arms against the Austrians. It had been chiefly the fear of the Governor that had prevented a rising before. It had been brewing for a long time. The people had been bound by a solemn oath to drive the enemy out of the country. All through Switzerland preparations for a revolution were going on, and nobles and peasants had united.
Directly the news arrived that the Governor was slain, meetings of the people were held in every town in Switzerland, and it was resolved to begin the revolution without delay. All the fortresses that Gessler had built during his years of rule were carried by assault on the same night. The last to fall was one which had only been begun a short time back, and the people who had been forced to help to build it spent a very pleasant hour pulling down the stones which had cost them such labour to put in their place. Even the children helped. It was a great treat to them to break what they pleased without being told not to.
“See,” said Tell, as he watched them, “in years to come, when these same children are gray-haired, they will remember this night as freshly as they will remember it to-morrow.”
A number of people rushed up, bearing the pole which Gessler’s soldiers had set up in the meadow. The hat was still on top of it, nailed to the wood by Tell’s arrow.
“Here’s the hat!” shouted Ruodi—”the hat to which we were to bow!”
“What shall we do with it?” cried several voices.
“Destroy it! Burn it!” said others. “To the flames with this emblem of tyranny!”
But Tell stopped them.
“Let us preserve it,” he said. “Gessler set it up to be a means of enslaving the country; we will set it up as a memorial of our newly-gained liberty. Nobly is fulfilled the oath we swore to drive the tyrants from our land. Let the pole mark the spot where the revolution finished.”
“But
“He will,” said Tell. “And let him come. And let him bring all his mighty armies. We have driven out the enemy that was in our land. We will meet and drive away the enemy that comes from another country. Switzerland is not easy to attack. There are but a few mountain passes by which the foe can approach. We will stop these with our bodies. And one great strength we have: we are united. And united we need fear no foe.”
“Hurrah!” shouted everybody.
“But who is this that approaches?” said Tell. “He seems excited. Perhaps he brings news.”
It was Rosselmann the pastor, and he brought stirring news.
“These are strange times in which we live,” said Rosselmann, coming up.
“Why, what has happened?” cried everybody.
“Listen, and be amazed.”
“Why, what’s the matter?”
