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In the third and fourth acts we hear no more of the conspirators, aside from some expressions of regret for the delay, and attention is concentrated upon Tell, who has hitherto taken no part except to rescue Baumgarten and to refuse his cooeperation at the Ruetli, on the ground that he is not the man for a confab, and that 'the strong man is mightiest alone'.
Moreover, it is extremely doubtful whether the green plateau of the Ruetli below Seelisberg, and some six hundred and fifty feet above the lake, with its miraculous springs, ever witnessed the patriotic gathering of the thirty-three peasants who, tradition asserts, there formed the league against Austrian rule, or heard the solemn oath they and their leaders, Stauffacher, Fuerst, and Arnold, mutually swore.
As the bailie left his castle to attend mass, some forty determined peasants, who had already bound themselves by oath to free their country at a solemn meeting on the steep promontory over the Lake of Lucerne known as the Ruetli, appeared before him carrying sheep, fowls, and other customary presents, and thus gained admission to the castle.
The German is Thalvogt, Ruler of the Valley the name given figuratively to a dense gray mist which the south wind sweeps into the valleys from the mountain tops. It is well known as the precursor of stormy weather. A steep rock standing on the north of Ruetli, and nearly opposite to Brumen.
Were they willing to do that, so it is said by Roesselmann at the Ruetli meeting, all their troubles would end forthwith; the cruel governors would deal kindly with them, would 'fondle' them.
And how superbly the picture is completed by the meeting at the Ruetli!
The conduct of Arnold, however, can hardly at this period of his life warrant the eulogies bestowed upon his memory, though he subsequently figures as one of the "Men of Ruetli."
The refusal of a peasant to obey this command, his arrest, trial, and condemnation to pierce with an arrow an apple placed on his own child's head, his dexterity in performing this feat, his escape from his enemies, his murder of the tyrant Gessler, the solemn compact sworn at Ruetli, and the revolutionary events that followed form the motive of the much-celebrated legend of William Tell.
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