Wilhelm Tell [32]
He has been summoned. Cheerly, sir! Take comfort! He has found his heart at last, and is our own. ATTING. Say, has he spoken for his native land? STAUFF. Ay, like a hero! ATTING. Wherefore comes he not, That he may take my blessing ere I die? I feel my life fast ebbing to a close. STAUFF. Nay, talk not thus, dear sir! This last short sleep Has much refresh'd you, and your eye is bright. ATTING. Life is but pain, and that has left me now; My sufferings, like my hopes, have pass'd away. [Observing the boy.] What boy is that? FURST. Bless him. Oh, good my lord! He is my grandson, and is fatherless. [Hedwig kneels with the boy before the dying man.] ATTING. And fatherless--I leave you all, ay, all! Oh wretched fate, that these old eyes should see My country's ruin, as they close in death! Must I attain the utmost verge of life, To feel my hopes go with me to the grave? STAUFF. (to Furst). Shall he depart 'mid grief and gloom like this? Shall not his parting moments be illumed By hope's inspiring beams? My noble lord, Raise up your drooping spirit! We are not Forsaken quite--past all deliverance. ATTING. Who shall deliver you? FURST. Ourselves. For know, The Cantons three are to each other pledged, To hunt the tyrants from the land. The league Has been concluded, and a sacred oath Confirms our union. Ere another year Begins its circling course--the blow shall fall. In a free land your ashes shall repose. ATTING. The league concluded! Is it really so? MELCH. On one day shall the Cantons rise together. All is prepared to strike--and to this hour The secret closely kept, though hundreds share it; The ground is hollow 'neath the tyrants' feet; Their days of rule are number'd, and ere long No trace will of their hateful sway be left. ATTING. Ay, but their castles, how to master them? MELCH. On the same day they, too, are doom'd to fall. ATTING. And are the nobles parties to this league? STAUFF. We trust to their assistance, should we need it; As yet the peasantry alone have sworn. ATTING. (raising himself up in great astonishment). And have the peasantry dared such a deed On their own charge, without the nobles' aid-- Relied so much on their own proper strength? Nay then, indeed, they want our help no more; We may go down to death cheer'd by the thought, That after us the majesty of man Will live, and be maintain'd by other hands. [He lays his hand upon the head of the child who is kneeling before him.] From this boy's head, whereon the apple lay, Your new and better liberty shall spring; The old is crumbling down--the times are changing-- And from the ruins blooms a fairer life. STAUFF. (to Furst). See, see, what splendour streams around his eye! This is not Nature's last expiring flame, It is the beam of renovated life. ATTING. From their old towers the nobles are descending, And swearing in the towns the civic oath. In Uechtland and Thurgau the work's begun; The noble Berne lifts her commanding head, And Freyburg is a stronghold of the free; The stirring Zurich calls her guilds to arms; And now, behold!--the ancient might of kings Is shiver'd 'gainst her everlasting walls. [He speaks what follows with a prophetic tone; his utterance rising into enthusiasm.] I see the princes and their haughty peers, Clad all in steel, come striding on to crush A harmless shepherd race with mailed hand. Desp'rate the conflict; 'tis for life or death; And many a pass will tell to after years Of glorious victories sealed in foeman's blood.[*] The peasant throws himself with naked breast, A willing victim on their serried spears; They yield--the flower of chivalry's cut down, And Freedom waves her conquering banner high. [*] An allusion to the gallant self-devotion of Arnold Struthan of Winkelried, at the battle of Sempach [9th July, 1386], who broke the Austrian phalanx by rushing on their lances, grasping as many of them as he could reach, and concentrating them upon his breast. The confederates rushed forward through the gap thus opened by the sacrifice of their comrade, broke and cut down their enemy's ranks, and soon became