Walter Furst and Arnold von Melchthal enter
MELCH.
If we should be surprised!
Have you no news for me from Unterwald?
Thus to be pent up like a felon here!
Skulk here in hiding, like a murderer?
Of the pert varlet, when before my eyes,
To drive away my handsome team of oxen.
FURST.
Than what the Governor had ordered him.
The penalty, however hard, in silence.
MELCH.
"That if the peasant must have bread to eat,
It cut me to the very soul to see
Unyoked them from the plough. As though they felt
On this I could contain myself no longer,
O, we old men can scarce command ourselves!
I'm only sorry for my father's sake!
My fostering care! The Governor detests him,
Stood stoutly up for right and liberty.
And there is none to shield him from their gripe.
Compose yourself, and wait in patience till
Away! away! I hear a knock! Perhaps
You are not safe from Landenberger's[*] arm
Governor of Unterwald, infamous for his cruelties to the Swiss,
slain at the battle of Morgarten, in 1315.
MELCH.
Away! I'll call you when the coast is clear.
[Melchthal.
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