Thus would I bless him: Mayst thou live, my boy,
To see thy country free, or die for her
As I do!"
Here he turns away with a slight convulsive movement mightily held down, and Sarnem exclaims, "Mark, he weeps!" The whole audience weep with him, too; as well they may, for the concentration of affecting circumstances in the scene forms one of the masterpieces of dramatic art. And Forrest played it in every minute particular with an intensity of nature and a closeness of truth effective to all, but agonizing to the sympathetic. His last special stroke of art was the natural yet cunningly-prepared contrast between the extreme nervous anxiety and agitation that marked his demeanor through all the preliminary stages of the fearful trial-shot for life and liberty, and his final calmness. Until the apple was on the head of his kneeling boy, and he had taken his position, he was all perturbation and misgiving. Then this spirit seemed to pass out of him with an irresolute shudder, and instantly he confirmed himself into an amazing steadiness. Every limb braced as marble, and as motionless, he stood, like a sculptured archer that looked life yet neither breathed nor stirred. The arrow flies, the boy bounds forward unhurt, with the transfixed apple in his hand. Tell then slays Gesler, and, dilating above the prostrated Austrian banner, amidst universal exultation both on and off the stage, closes the play with the shouted words,—
"To arms! and let no sword be sheathed
Until our land, from cliff to lake, is free!
Free as our torrents are that leap our rocks,
Or as our peaks that wear their caps of snow
In very presence of the regal sun!"