If, now, we examine the different parts of the legend itself, to see if we cannot establish its historical value from internal evidence, we find our task still more discouraging. All the arguments put forward by the partisans of Tell have been found to fail upon closer scrutiny.

Certainly it is not unreasonable to suppose that if the great archer had once lived in the forest cantons his name would be found in some of the ancient records, but the most minute search in the archives of the three cantons has failed to show that such a man as Thall, Tall, or William Tell ever existed. In the midst of the controversy upon this question which broke out at the end of the last century, a Johann Imhof, vicar of Schaddorf, a village adjoining Bürglen, the traditional birthplace of Tell, searched diligently for proofs of his existence. He announced that he had discovered the name in two places in the burial register (Jahrzeitbuch) of his own parish, and again in the parsonage book (Pfarrbuch) of the neighboring village of Attinghausen. Investigation has revealed that, of these two entries, one had been wrongly read, the other had been tampered with. In the first case de Tello was really de Trullo, and in the second Täll, originally Näll. Imhof also cited documents, as well as Balthazar in his Défense de Guillaume Tell; but upon examination these supposed proofs failed utterly, and only harmed the cause they were intended to sustain. They consist of quotations from well-known chronicles, which date from a time when the tradition was already fully developed, or of documents bearing the strongest internal evidence of forgery.

Nor can the pilgrimages which are held in his memory, the Tell's Chapels or other local features which are shown to travelers at Altdorf and Bürglen, be regarded as testifying to his existence, since, like the chronicles, they either

date from a time when the tradition was fully developed, or have been found to be connected with altogether different circumstances. The famous chapel on the Lake of Lucerne seems to have been originally designed for the use of fishermen; the one at the Hohle Gasse, near Küssnacht, is first mentioned in 1570, and the one at Bürglen in 1582, long after the chroniclers had fixed the legend upon the hearts and minds of the people.

The supposed site of the William Tell episode at Altdorf is in the centre of the village, not far from the market-place. Here you will come upon an heroic statue of the archer — alas, in plaster! It was made for the Federal Schützenfest, held in Zürich in 1857, and presented afterwards to Altdorf. Tell stands in the act of hurling defiance at the bailiff, and the appropriate verse from Schiller's play is engraved upon the pedestal. On the whole, the pose is not bad, but unfortunately the good fellow looks squatty; his breadth is evidently too great for his height, although I ceased to wonder at this disproportion when I was told that he had to be painted over annually in order to keep the plaster from crumbling; with every coat of paint he grows stouter, and old citizens, who remember him in his slim youth, dismayed at seeing him thus swell before their eyes, have determined to dismiss him altogether, and have a grand marble statue once for all.

From this spot Tell is reported to have shot the arrow, while his little son stood just beyond, under an ancient limetree. This tree, having withered and died, was cut down in 1569 by a certain Besler, magistrate of the village (Dorfvogt), and a fountain erected in its stead, which now stands there surmounted by a rude statue of Besler himself. As a matter of fact, the lime-tree is historical, for we know that assizes were held under it, and sentences signed as having been pronounced "under the lime

tree at Altdorf; "but of course all this does not bear upon the truth or falsity of the Tell tradition, since chroniclers, if they chose to adorn their tale, would naturally select genuine local features.

Near by rises a tower, at one time pronounced to be over the place where the boy stood, but now known to be much older than the period in which William Tell is said to have lived; that is, at the beginning of the fourteenth century. It was probably the seat of a mayor who collected tithes for the abbey of nuns (Fraumünster) in Zürich, to which institution the greater part of the present canton of Uri at one time belonged. As for the tower itself, although it has been ridiculously modernized by the addition of a strange combination of roof and green blinds, it is a simple, square structure, like the towers which still stand in the neighboring villages of Bürglen and Silenen, and like the famous Zwing Uri, the ruins of which may be seen near Amsteg, at the entrance of the Maderaner Thal. The sides are adorned with two frescoes: one almost effaced, but betraying signs of good workmanship; the other well preserved, and representing various scenes in the legend. Nothing more atrocious in the way of design or grotesque in conception than the latter can very well be imagined; for the style, if indeed it can be said to have any, is a sort of exaggerated late Renaissance, very exaggerated and very late, the work, doubtless, of some strolling Italian house-painter. Even that highly picturesque incident, the setting of a hat upon a pole, a feature peculiar to the Swiss version of the legend, so far as is known, is susceptible of a perfectly natural historical explanation. The historian Meyer von Knonau, noticing that a hat figures in his own family coat of arms, and in those of many other families whose name is Meyer, has come to the conclusion that the setting up of the mayor's hat was a regular custom at the Altdorf assizes,

and that what is represented in the legend as the whim of a tyrant was in reality a well-established official procedure. Like the statue of Tell in Altdorf, all the so-called facts in support of the legend crumble at the touch of strict inquiry, and are in need of continual repainting if they are to hold together at all.

Not to protract this argument to tedious length, I will merely cite one more proof of the flimsiness of the structure upon which the whole story rests. We now know that the rôle ascribed to the bailiff Gessler is an historical impossibility. The history of the Gessler family has been written by an untiring investigator, Rochholz, who has brought together from every conceivable source the documents which bear upon the subject. From his investigations it results that no member of that family is mentioned as holding any office whatsoever in the three cantons, or as being murdered by a man Thall, Tall, or William Tell. It is contrary to all contemporary documents to suppose that an Austrian bailiff ruled over Uri after 1231, or that such a one would have owned the castle of Küssnacht, the history of which property has been carefully traced, and which was in the hands of its true owners, the knights of Küssinach, at the time when Gessler is reported to have made it his residence.

The fact is that in Gessler we are confronted by a curious case of confusion in identity. At least three totally different men seem to have been blended into one in the course of an attempt to reconcile the different versions of the three cantons. Felix Hemmerlein, of Zürich, in 1450 tells of a Habsburg governor living on the little island of Schwanau, in the Lake of Lowerz, who seduced a maid of Schwyz and was killed by her brothers. Then there was another person, strictly historical, Knight Eppo of Küssinach (Küssnacht), who, while acting as bailiff for the dukes of Austria,

put down two revolts of the inhabitants in his district, one in 1284 and another in 1302. Finally there was the tyrant bailiff mentioned in the ballad of Tell, whom, by the way, a chronicler writing in 1510 calls, not Gessler, but a Count of Seedorf. These three persons were combined, and the result was named Gessler.

To trace the legend to a mythical source and to reveal its inconsistencies is simple enough, but to explain the historical application which has been made of it is quite another matter. If William Tell is the hero of a widespread Germanic myth, how came he to be connected with the history of Switzerland at all? Why has not tradition handed down as founder of the Confederation one of those active patriots who are known to have lived and labored for Swiss freedom, men like Stoupacher (Stauffacher) of Schwyz, or Attinghausen of Uri? Here lies the main difficulty; but an explanation even of this is at hand, which on the whole satisfies the peculiar conditions of the problem. Generally speaking, pure historical analysis is not entertaining reading, though it is apt to be instructive; but this question of William Tell not only throws a great deal of light upon the extraordinary methods of medieval writers, but also contains elements that may, without exaggeration, be termed diverting, inasmuch as it resolves itself into a sort of political hoax played by the venerable patriots of Uri upon their unsuspecting contemporaries, centuries ago, and then transmitted to us to be unraveled and exposed.

When the Song and The White Book appeared at the end of the fifteenth century, the Swiss Confederates stood at the very apex of their military glory, having just completed a series of great victories by defeating in three pitched battles the richest prince in Europe, Charles the Bold of Burgundy, who, according to the old rhyme, lost

"Bei Grandson das Gut, Bei Murten den Mut,

Bei Nancy das Blut."

Filled with a spirit of patriotic exaltation, they turned to magnify their national origin, as is the wont of all nations when they rise to importance. But each of the three districts which had united to form the nucleus of the Confederation, Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden, tried to secure for itself as much credit as possible in the founding of it, thus giving rise to a variety of versions. Schwyz supplied the story of a certain genuinely historical personage, Stoupacher; Unterwalden, that of a youth designated as living in the Melchi, near Sarnen, and arbitrarily named Melchthal by later writers; and Uri attempted to turn to political account a legendary William Tell, an old favorite amongst the people of that district. The notary of Sarnen collected these stories, and did his best to give each of the three lands an equal share in the founding of the Confederation. In time the mythical hero distanced his rivals in popular favor, perhaps for the very reason that he was mythical and his family unknown in those parts, a sort of "dark horse" upon whom the jealous claimants could unite. As subsequent historians based their accounts almost exclusively upon The White Book of Sarnen, it is not necessary to examine their work in detail. Suffice it to say that they did not hesitate to supply the persons with names and the events with dates wherever these were needed, although this was done so carelessly that the greatest discrepancies arose, and discredit was cast even upon that which was really historical. The traditions found their best exponent in Giles (Ægidius) Tschudi, of Glarus, from whom Schiller in turn derived most of the material for his play. But the Swiss chroniclers need not have resorted to legends of doubtful origin in order to invest the rise of their Confederation with the interest it ought always to have

commanded. In attempting this they rather obscured than displayed the qualities which make their ancestors worthy of our admiration, and pressed into the background those features of Swiss history which best deserve to be studied. The impression we derive from the perusal of the documents is nobler, more natural, and more instructive than that which the cycle of legends can give us. The chroniclers would have us believe that the sacred flame of liberty was kindled by the whim of a petty tyrant, the liberation of the people effected by murder; they would make the origin of the oldest federal republic in existence, the most stable of modern states, dependent upon a trick, upon the chances of an arrow in its flight, when in reality it is based upon the eternal laws of the brotherhood of man; they would represent as fortuitous, abnormal, and sudden what was eminently deliberate, lawful,

and long drawn through centuries of strife and struggle. Although it is not within the scope of this article to treat of the real rise of the Swiss Confederation, as reconstructed by modern historians, still it may be said here that nothing could have been more heroic than the ceaseless struggle waged by the early patriots of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden against the encroachments of the house of Habsburg-Austria, or more admirable than the patient wisdom with which they finally won their independence. History has recorded no words in which childlike faith in the justice of a cause and prophetic insight into its inevitable triumph have been better expressed than in the closing sentence of the league concluded in 1291 by these three Forest States: "The above written statutes, decreed for the common weal and health, are to endure forever, God willing."

W. D. McCrackan.

ΤΟ

Annie Fields.

"WHEN future ages celebrate the names of Washington and Franklin, they will add that of Morris." These are the words of David Ramsay, the worthy biographer of Washington and historian of the Revolution; and writing in 1790, he stated a comparative estimate of these men widely prevalent at that time. But his prediction is as yet far from fulfillment. In these days of centennial celebrations the names of Washington and Franklin are on nearly every tongue; and within a few years they have been the subjects of several noteworthy biographies, and of numerous sketches, criticisms, and reviews. Yet seldom is the name of Robert Morris associated prominently with theirs. Concerning him during the whole century not a dozen papers have been published, and not a single biography of the first class. Was Morris, then, overestimated by his contemporaries? Or is the obscurity that surrounds his name to be ascribed to the prejudice and shortsightedness of historians? Whatever the reason, a character so pure and magnanimous, and a career so varied and active yet so pathetic, should not remain unknown and unappreciated by the American people.

In the early life of Robert Morris two facts stand out in relief, his foreign birth and his honest, sturdy self-help. To their influence, doubtless, was due much of that independence, boldness, and robustness which marked his maturity. He was born in Liverpool in 1734, and came to America at the age of thirteen. Left an orphan soon after, with but little property, he resolved to give up his studies, and to obtain remunerative employment; and naturally his course was largely determined by what had been the occupation and associations of his father. The latter had been

a merchant for many years in Liverpool, England, and for a short time prior to his death at Oxford, Maryland. The same calling was now chosen by the son, and under very favorable auspices. He changed his residence to Philadelphia, the thriving metropolis of the colonies, and obtained a position in the counting-house of Charles Willing, the proprietor of a large and well-established mercantile business. Evidently this opportunity was fully improved; for in 1754, at the death of Charles Willing, his son, Thomas Willing, took Morris into partnership, though the latter was but twenty years of age.

The firm of Willing and Morris enjoyed great prosperity, constantly gaining in the confidence of the public and in the extension of its trade. At the approach of the Revolution it had become the largest importing house on the continent. From a commercial standpoint, therefore, it viewed with deep concern the gradual alienation of the colonies from Great Britain, involving as it did a corresponding diminution in the import trade. Yet both Willing and Morris preferred patriotism to self-interest. They promptly signed the nonimportation agreement in 1765, and readily joined other temperate measures against unwarranted aggression. But to all violent or revolutionary movements they were uniformly and firmly opposed. Throughout the exciting events and fierce contests that preceded and finally precipitated the Revolution they were found on the side of the moderate or conservative party, which, led by John Dickinson, advocated constitutional resistance, in opposition to violent separation, as a means of maintaining the rights of America.

This course ran directly counter to the Declaration of Independence. When