Such was the subject of Landenberg’s reflections, many of which he occasionally imparted to some of his confidential attendants, as he rode along, totally unconscious of the foes so near him, and of the danger which threatened the speedy overthrow of all his ambitious hopes and projects. Here and there a sentence or two spoken in a louder voice than ordinary reached the hearing of the Helvetians, who were concealed among the various caverns Of the Castle-rock: and then was many a sword half drawn from the scabbard to impose eternal silence upon the insolent boaster. The vigilance of the prudent chiefs, however, and consideration for the public welfare compelled them to repress their unseasonable zeal. An over-hasty attack would have been sufficient to ruin every thing. Landenberg, it’s true, would probably have perished, but only to make room for a successor perhaps even worse than himself. The object here was not to make away with a single tyrant; no, it was to throw off a disgraceful yoke for ever, and to bequeath the precious treasure Liberty to their children, and to the children of their children even down to the latest posterity. Landenberg therefore was suffered to proceed with his attendants unmolested; nothing gave them warning of the danger, which lurked so near, except now and then a low whispering noise among the brambles, which made their hair stand an end, for it was now the ghostly hour; and as they dreaded its being something supernatural, the sound only served to make those who heard it pursue their course with the greater speed.